Cost of a Secret
by nomdeplume1313
Summary: Roy has been keeping something from Ed that is too big not to destroy what they have when it comes out. Can they get over it, or will it end their relationship?
1. Morning

_I don't own these characters and I don't profit from them._

**Chapter 1**

**_Morning_**

Ed woke to the sound of the shower in the next room. His lover always was an early riser, well, in comparison to him. Though of the two, Ed supposed he was much more of a morning person. He couldn't help it if morning didn't start before eight o'clock for him; he was still more chipper than Roy was by ten and Roy regularly woke up at 7:30 a.m. each day, whether he had work or not.

The blond rose from the bed, grateful he had at least managed a shower the night before. He'd never quite figured out how, after sex, Roy could manage to fall asleep so easily. Then again, Roy only cleaned when it got him out of something he loathed doing more. There were those who assumed the man, either because of his position or age or his usually immaculate appearance, was a neat-freak, but Ed knew otherwise. His house looked nice because Roy had a maid and a boyfriend who actually became anal about cleaning thanks in large part to the older man's mess. 

Of course, Roy didn't really need to clean himself off any more than he needed to clean his home. Ed did both for him without any complaint. After all, it only seemed far that Ed wipe Roy off since the older man would be the one with a sore ass the next morning. 

With a smile, Ed grabbed a pair of his boxers from the dresser and pulled them on. He then went to the closet to pull out the military uniform he was now forced to wear. 

Yes, even that was a misconception about Roy Mustang. He had been a ladies man, no denying that, but with another man, well, natural tendencies put him on the bottom. Not all of the time, obviously. Even though Ed preferred where he was, so to speak, he enjoyed switching things once in a while as much as the other man. 

He began putting on the military uniform, leaving the shirt and coat for last as he put on the white undershirt. He would have to have breakfast, and he wasn't going to listen to Roy about slopping up the uniform "just because you don't want to wear it." Not wanting to wear it had nothing to do with spilling cereal or ketchup on the thing. And it wasn't as though Ed wasn't perfectly capable of pulling the stain from the blue wool. 

He carried the upper half of the uniform down to the kitchen and draped it over a chair. He did his best to ignore the full photo of Mustang's team following the fall of the fuhrer. Ed was there, looking a little worse for the wear, with his body bandaged up and bruises on his face thanks to Envy. For whatever reason, after that moment, he was considered part of the older man's group. Of course, he hadn't been the only one included there. One other figure, taller than Mustang, stood at Ed's side in the picture, looking in much better shape than the shorter blond. 

Though Ed didn't look at the photo and tried to pretend it wasn't there, the act of pretending, the pretense that he hadn't seen it, brought it back to his mind. He could see it clearly, could see the tall teen clearly, and it hurt. 

He sighed, but went to the kitchen anyway and rooted through the cabinets to find a carton of oatmeal. He got some water boiling in the kettle on the stove and pulled out the brown sugar. Roy would probably have cereal, but Ed knew he couldn't. Though he sometimes managed to tolerate the taste of milk in the cereal, he always felt a little sick afterwards. 

Yes, much to his delight, Ed was lactose intolerant. He had rubbed that in everyone's faces. Especially Al. 

He lips quirked down in a frown. 

"What's wrong?" Roy asked as he walked into the kitchen. 

"Just thinking," Ed answered. 

"Ah," Roy said, a smug tone to his voice, even as he limped to the icebox. "Strenuous activity." 

"Oh, bite me, old man." 

Roy then ruffled Ed's hair. Purposely, the young man was sure, because it irritated the major nearly as much as short jokes. 

"You know," Ed said, trying to find a tactful way to broach this subject with his boyfriend, "I was talking to Hawkeye, and I have almost a months worth of vacation coming to me. I almost never take it." 

"Well," Roy said, pulling the milk out of the fridge and setting it on the counter, "then it would be a good opportunity to go to Resembool to visit your brother while I'm gone. I am assuming you were thinking of him earlier when you looked so serious." 

"I don't want to see him," Ed said. "And I don't think he'd want to see me much, either." 

"He called for you again last night, and I had to lie that I hadn't seen you," Roy said. "That doesn't sound like he doesn't want to see you." 

Ed paced through the kitchen. Not only did he not want to have this discussion _again,_ but he wanted to go with the older man to… well, wherever it was he was going. 

"That wasn't why I was suggesting it," Ed said, flicking a sock-covered toe over a loose tile of the linoleum floor. 

Roy sighed as he got out of a box of raisin bran and poured it into a bowl. "Ed, we've been through this. My trip is one I have to take myself." 

Ed looked up at the older man. "I just don't understand why. I mean, a year, Roy. A whole year and you're still taking these two-week vacations where you go off someplace only you know where. And lately, you've been getting all these phone calls…" 

Though Roy wasn't his first when it came to much of anything, from crush to kiss to even sex, the relationship Ed had with him was the longest he could remember and never before had Ed moved in with his boyfriend. If this was the first that Roy was, they wouldn't that at least mean the older man could share a little with him? It was disconcerting to think how lithe he knew about Roy's past, particularly now as Ed was facing every sign that something was very wrong. 

"Ed, I just have some business I need to deal with," Roy said. "It's personal, but do you really think I'd mess around on you? Because I enjoy my privates a bit too much for that." He kissed Ed on the forehead. "I enjoy you a bit too much for that." 

Oh, yes, he enjoyed Ed, loved his company, cared for him, liked him, but not once had Roy said the words Ed so easily blurted out in times of passion and would have just as easily other times, if he didn't have the ability to think and remind himself that Roy had never returned them. 

Even looking up at the dark eyes, Ed wasn't entirely sure he could see there was anything more than a fondness for him. Sometimes, he thought he saw something other than that, but most of the time, he wondered if Roy could feel more strongly about a pet dog. Hell, Ed had heard him say on more than one occasion that he loved dogs. Was it that much more difficult to say that he loved Ed? 

Realizing he was being a bit of a girl, Ed returned to fixing his breakfast. Roy would say it when he was ready to, and if he never did, things were pretty good as they were. The kettle was squealing now, which meant his water was ready. 

"You're going to have that limp all day, aren't you?" Ed asked. "Sorry about that." 

Roy shrugged. "It's okay. I'd be more upset if I was this uncomfortable knowing I was going to have to ride a train all the way… well, for several hours." 

Ed poured the water into the bowl of plain oatmeal, trying not to think how close Roy had been to blurting out where he was heading. He mixed in the brown sugar and some cinnamon before turning and eating as he stood. 

"You know, there is a table," Roy said, as he stood, spooning his cereal into his mouth. "I may have trouble sitting on the hard wooden chairs, but that doesn't mean that you can't." 

Ed shrugged. "No point," he said as he ate. "I've got to go upstairs and brush my teeth and all that before we head out. Sitting down just takes time." 

"And I can see you are saving valuable time by talking while you eat," Roy said, before spooning another bite into his mouth. 

Ed continued to eat as though he hadn't heard the older man comment on his bad habits, save for the single digit that he held up on the hand that held his bowl, which silently told Roy exactly what he thought. It earned a chuckle from the older man, but nothing more. The angry outbursts were gone from them both. Roy still called Ed a brat, Ed still called Roy old, Roy could get away with short jokes, and Ed could even make teasing remarks about the scar at Roy's cheekbone. Ed didn't do the last often often, unless he was speaking affectionately while teasing. After all, Roy only teased about Ed's automail when he was complaining how much it weighed when Ed inadvertently cuddled as they slept or the one time he'd tried to carry him up the stairs in a romantic flight of fancy—Roy had pulled his back out for his efforts on that one. 

Ed finished his oatmeal long before Roy finished his own cereal, and he made his way up to the bathroom to finish getting ready for the day. 

Seeing Ed was gone for at least a few minutes, Roy dumped the rest of his food in the garbage and went to the phone. He gave the operator the number he needed and anxiously waited to hear someone pick up on the other end. 

"Hello?" the voice asked. 

"Karen, it's Roy." He put a hand in his pocket, as though that effort of making himself look calm would allow his voice to convey that in its tone. 

"What do you want? Because it's just me here right now." 

Roy knew otherwise without any doubt. If she really was alone at the moment, he wouldn't be making the trip to Eastern Command, but he didn't dare accuse her. Not yet. "Karen, I was just wondering how you're holding up. I heard that your work has been going really well." 

"My work has been going like crap and you know it, Roy, I told you so the last time you asked," she said. 

"Are you still investigating the research you told me about before?" 

"Naturally," she said as though it was the most idiotic thing he could ask. 

"Are you having any luck with it?" Roy asked. 

"Who's that?" Ed asked, having come downstairs again. Roy held up a finger to signal Ed to wait. 

"Look, Roy," Karen said, "you're already screwing the little prodigy at Central and you have the whole 'hero' thing going for you. Is there really any need to steal my work?" 

"It is hardly your work," Roy rebutted. "It is the work of someone else that I want nothing to do with. I just wonder why you continue to pursue it." 

"I continue it because he was onto something great, and because finally succeeding would allow me to become the most well-known alchemist of my time. Does that bother you?" 

Roy wanted to answer truthfully, but instead muttered a "No" before being abruptly hung up on. 

"Who was that?" Ed demanded. "I waited patiently, now I want an answer." 

"It is an alchemist in the East I was familiar with," Roy answered. 

"And what is the research this alchemist is doing?" 

"Some fairly dangerous stuff," Roy said. "Just for the sake of fame." 

"Do I know the research this alchemist is doing?" 

"I'm sure you do," Roy said, not giving away anything more. If he said what Karen was trying, it would open up so many memories for the younger man. If he dared to mention Karen, it could start a mess Roy wasn't sure he could clean up. "Get your uniform on. We'll be late if you don't get dressed soon." 

Ed looked at him in shock. "Best damned alchemy resource at your fingertips and you won't even talk," he muttered just loud enough for Roy to hear as he went to the kitchen to get the coat and white shirt on. 

Roy wondered if the damage wasn't already done by his secret. This was going to come out. Soon. 


	2. Photos and Phone Calls

**Chapter 2**

_**Photos and Phone Calls**_

Roy could not believe Ed was still pouting, even as they reached HQ. Hardly a single word was said as they drove together in Mustang's convertible. Roy was not used to this type of silence from the usually exuberant young man, and it was somewhat unnerving not to hear the normal chatter from the blond. Ed was always awake and alert long before Roy could even contemplate being coherent, but today, Ed was silent.

Even as they reached the Central office, Ed hadn't even said goodbye to him when they'd gone to their separate offices. 

Still, he could hear Ed's only words to him when they'd gotten in the car as clearly as if they were being said to him now, as he walked to his own double doors. "I know you're keeping something from me." 

Of course Roy was keeping something from him. He had to. If he'd had a choice, he… Well, he knew he had a choice, he'd always had a choice, but at this point, telling Ed wasn't going to make a difference. It probably never would have stopped him from being hurt by this secret. Perhaps once they became friends it would have been safe to tell, but any time after that, as they became closer, it would have hurt Ed too much to know that Roy had been keeping something so big from him. 

Roy still wasn't sure what had originally kept him from telling Ed, but for attachments to form, hurt to happen, it just wasn't something Roy wanted. He'd just known when he entered his relationship with Ed that it simply couldn't last. He'd been sure that the young man wouldn't want anything to do with him for very long, but here he was, now a year later, and still with the stubborn blond. 

Still keeping things from him. 

Roy went into his office and began working on paperwork. Riza always accused that when he wanted to try to ignore something, paperwork suddenly became the most interesting thing in the world to him, but otherwise, she could never manage to force him to get any done. Admittedly, that was true, but Roy didn't have to like what it implied about his work ethic. 

He'd been signing papers for maybe an hour when Riza stormed into his office. He'd expected her to stop short when she saw him at work—she usually did out of pure surprise, if nothing else, not that he'd admit it was shock-worthy—but this time, she continued on, looking ready to take him down a few pegs, if not shoot a few rounds into him. She shut the door behind her, none to gently, and stopped to his desk. 

"I spoke to Ed this morning, Sir," she said. Roy repressed the desire to shudder at the coldness of her words. This wasn't just going to be a lecture. It was going to be a guilt trip fueled by anger and disgust at him. 

"Did you?" Roy asked. 

"How can you not tell him?" she asked. 

"Riza, I have no idea what you are—" 

"I am not Ed, Roy," she said, warningly, breaking the rule that they would not address one another by their first names while still in the office. "I _know_ what you are keeping from him." 

Roy bit his lip. "The relationship was too new to tell him. There was a chance—" 

"Roy, of your entire team, the only person who doesn't know is the person you go home to every night. I'm not saying it would have been responsible to tell the thirteen-year-old, even the fifteen-year-old Ed. But what about the one three years ago who trusted you enough to stay in the military to work under you at the office? The one you fought alongside two years ago?" 

"Riza, maybe I should have, but how do you just broach that subject? Do you really just blurt something like that out? And once we were dating, what was I to say? Should I have let them meet? Because I know Ed would have insisted that they at least do that. Then if Ed and I broke up… we won't have a pretty break-up, Riza, and this way at least, I'm the only one hurt." 

"No, Ed would be hurt, too. Particularly if he hears that you doomed your relationship from the beginning." Riza shook her head at Roy, looking positively sick at him. 

"Riza, there isn't anything I can say now that will make it better, not after al this time." 

"So, you've been so certain it would one day end, but yet you're so scared of losing him that you'd rather let him suffer? Thinking you're cheating on him? Maybe he's the one who you're cheating on someone else with? You'd let him go through all this so you can just enjoy your relationship with him while it lasts?" Her eyes narrowed at Roy. "You're low, Roy Mustang. Very low. I would never have expected you capable of this." 

Roy looked up at her, but she was already heading to his office door. 

"I know," he said quietly. 

She paused, as though she heard him, but made no other indication that she had. He watched her leave and he groaned to himself. 

Ed sat at his desk, in his office at Central. Never would he have thought the day would come that he would have a desk, but here he was, perfectly miserable at his desk for a reason that had nothing to do with paperwork or the tedium of a job so stationary. He flicked a piece of dust off of the dark walnut wood. This used to be Roy's desk, from when he was a colonel. Roy got a new one with his promotion to major general, and Ed got one when he got a desk job as a lieutenant colonel. 

He sighed. A lieutenant colonel. He had become a bastard colonel himself. 

Well, he hoped he wasn't a bastard like him. He didn't think his subordinates talked about him the way he'd always talked about Roy. 

The young man looked at the picture on his desk and flipped it down. It was of him and Roy when they'd been at the beach one weekend. That had been one of the stupidest things they'd done. Roy and water simply didn't mix, and Ed always sank down in the water, even in the sand. 

The picture was of Roy trying to pry Ed from the sand. One of those beachside photographers had gotten the shot of Ed in a ridiculous swimsuit, Roy in one even worse. The older man had his arms wrapped around Ed, laughing as he tried to pry the younger man from the clutches of the hot South Cretan sand. Ed was somewhat more panicked in his smile as he clung onto Roy, kicking his flesh leg against the sand. Roy's face was already red from a sunburn. Ed had warned him to put on some kind of sunblock. 

He groaned and put the picture back right. It was pointless to cover the thing. He could see Roy's lobster red skin without looking at the picture. It was absolutely stupid to try to not think about it, just like it was idiotic to try to ignore the picture of Al. 

Looking at the little pink sheet of paper from Fuery, who had taken over as Ed's secretary once the blond became a lieutenant colonel, he saw that Al had called again. He was getting persistent again. Ed wondered why, but seeing the desktop calendar, it made sense. October 1. 

Ed put his head in his hands. 

He hated to admit how much he missed Al and talking to him. He bet his little brother would have been here in Central harping on Roy to find out what it was the older man was keeping from him. Al probably would have found out by now, and Ed's relationship with the older man would be stronger for it, or it would be over. 

But if Al was talking to Ed again, it would mean Ed backed down, and he couldn't do that. He had to protect his younger brother, even if it was from himself. 

There was a knock on Ed's door. "Come in," he said. He knew who it was already, and wasn't surprised to hear Fuery's voice. 

"Lieutenant Colonel?" 

Ed looked up at him between his fingers. "Lieutenant?" he asked. 

"Your brother is on the phone again. What do you want me to do? The women at the switchboard are getting angry at you because he is so polite to them when he waits for me to come back with a reason why you can't speak to him." 

Ed sighed. "I'll… I'll talk to him. This is a tough time of year for us." 

Fuery nodded and exited the room. In a matter of a few seconds, Ed heard the faint ringing of his phone. He'd hated how loud it used to ring and had "fixed" that about a month ago. He picked up the receiver. "Hello?" 

"Brother? Is Captain Hawkeye holding a gun to your head?" 

Ed wanted to laugh, though he held it back, because he didn't know if he did what kind of laughter it would be. The joke had been a good one, despite the guilt it evoked—Ed hadn't spoken to Al in a year, hadn't seen him longer than that—and he might have had a chuckle at it. Yet, lingering in the background was the faintest hysterical laughter that hung around because _this was Al on the phone with him_. After all these months, he was bringing himself to talk to his brother. 

Holding in the laughter he feared might escape forced Ed to clamp his mouth shut, giving Al no answer. 

"Brother, that was a joke," he heard the voice on the other end say. "Brother? She isn't really, is she?" There was concern in Al's voice, and it made Ed want to slide down beneath his desk. 

"No, Al," Ed choked out. "She's not." 

"Are you okay, Ed?" Al asked. "You sound… in pain." 

Just buried beneath a ton of guilt at the moment combined with a headache from trying to figure out what it was Roy was hiding from him. 

"No, Al, I'm fine. Just a little tired. That's all." 

"You're lying," Al said. 

"I am… not…" Ed pulled the receiver to glare at it. How did Al do that? How did he still know all of Ed's tells? Really, was he that obvious? 

"You are," Al said. "What's wrong, Brother? Is it something with you and the major general?" Then, Al's voice got softer. "Is it because I'm calling you? I didn't mean to get the operators to guilt you into this. If you don't want to talk—" 

"Al, stop," Ed said. "Things are just a little rough at the moment. I don't want to talk about it." 

"Oh." Then silence. 

Again, Ed looked at the receiver. Al knew more than he was letting on, probably thanks to the switchboard operators. They were worse than Havoc and Breda combined when it came to office gossip. Largely because having the ability to listen in on any conversation was too much of a temptation for them to pass up. Especially now that listening in on a conversation wasn't the automatic death sentence it was during the old administration. 

"What do you know, Al?" Ed asked. 

"I heard that you and the major general weren't talking as much today from Shelly," Al said. 

"You know the operators' names?" Ed asked, incredulously. It wasn't that he took the men and women there for granted, it was just that he was usually on the phone with them for so short a time he never had time to ask. 

"Well, _they_ talk to me," Al said, then hastily added. "I'm sorry, Brother. I shouldn't have said that." 

"Yes, you should have. I deserve that." Ed sighed. 

"Do you want me to come to Central, Brother? I think Winry could spare me for a while." 

Did he? Did Ed want Al coming to Central? 

"If you don't, I understand," Al said. "But it would be nice to see some of the familiar faces." 

Ed bit his lip. "I suppose if you wanted to come, but this would be strictly a social visit. Nothing has changed in your permanent record, Al. It won't." 

Ed mentally kicked himself. Why did he have to bring that up? Why did he have to point out the very reason they hadn't spoken in so long? 

He could hear his brother sigh from the other side. "You know, Brother, I realize your opinion of me as an alchemist isn't going to change. I've come to terms with that. I was just trying to be a decent brother. If you don't want me to come, then I don't have to come." 

"I…" Ed's voice suddenly grew small despite himself. "I'd like to see you." 

"I'll be there in a few days," Al said. "I'll see you then." 

"Goodbye, Al," Ed said. 

There was a click on the other end of the line. Ed hung up the phone, tears stinging his eyes. He hadn't wanted to hurt his brother like that, but Al had been completely deaf to reason. 

And despite it all, despite what Ed had done, his baby brother was willing to come here just because Ed was hurting. 

It made Ed want to hit something, but he'd already re-alchemized much of his walls, and was unsure how many transmutations they could take. 

Roy was sitting in his office. It was nearly lunch, but he didn't hope that Ed might actually want to join him for the meal as they usually did. Finally, the young man's appetite had slowed down, though his love for food had not. 

He glanced at the photo on his desk, much less humorous than the one Ed kept on his own. It was them on the same trip to the beach, with the blond grinning ridiculously at the camera as Roy held him from behind. The older man hadn't seen that smile in a long time, and he doubted when it would appear it would be for him. Someone else, more willing to talk and be as open as Ed himself was might make the teen smile like that, but Roy was certain it would not be him ever again. 

The phone rang, interrupting thoughts Roy was all too happy to have interrupted. Where they were headed was not going to be a happy place. Though, he suspected that this was not going to be a pleasant phone call, as only a handful of people had the direct line to his office. 

"Major General Mustang speaking," Roy said. 

"Hello, this is Dr. Karlsen," the voice said. "You told us to call you if we noticed the absenteeism continuing—" 

"I understand," Roy said. "I am leaving tomorrow morning, and will be there two days after that." 

"We can talk in more detail then," Dr. Karlsen said. "I will also bring in Nurse Landry to talk about some of the things we've noticed. Will you be coming here before or after visiting Ms. Bradford?" 

"Before. After, there will be no time. I'll be leaving immediately." 

"Good luck, sir," the woman said. "The judicial system might be against it, but I support you entirely. I will attest to that in court as well." 

"Thank you," he said before hearing a click at the other end. 

He hung up his own phone, wondering if he came to see any of the horrific things he expected to see when he visited Karen, if he could refrain from doing the woman serious harm. 


	3. Unofficial, Important Business

**Chapter 3**

**_Unofficial, Important Business _**

When Ed had gotten the note from Riza that Roy was going to leave the office early because of "unofficial, important business," Ed had assumed that would mean he would be walking. After all, Ed wasn't as out of shape as his older lover—well, that wasn't entirely true about Roy, but Ed wasn't feeling particularly generous today. He had also expected that if Roy had given a damn about transportation for Ed, the message would have come from him, not Riza. It wasn't as though Ed anticipated some little note with hearts on it that smelled of Roy, but he'd hoped things weren't so far gone that all he would manage was a note through Riza's efficient if somewhat cold hand.

Ed had left the office, fully prepared to walk home, but was surprised to find a long, black car waiting for him.

"Come on, boss, get in," Havoc said, learning across the front seat to open the passenger's side door.

The young man walked down the front steps and climbed into the vehicle. He looked at the other man, without thinking how surprised he must have still looked.

"You didn't think the Chief would make you walk, did you?" Havoc asked. "You know how protective he'd been since those rebels tried an attack last month."

"And they were caught three weeks ago," Ed said. "And they only used paintbombs to attack. Not really a threat."

"True," Havoc said, followed by a chuckle.

Ed managed to snicker at the memory. The redheaded first lieutenant had been dyed rather than painted. His hair was still growing out the green tint, but you had to look closely to even see it.

From that point on, however, the drive was silent. Ed knew Havoc wanted to talk to him, but the blond's technique in getting him to was severely lacking. Roy could charm information from Ed and make him think he gave it willingly. Riza could scare it out of him. Breda could con it out. Falman would bluntly and methodically ask questions until Ed gave in and answered. Fuery was the most devious of all, in that he would disarm Ed to the point where he was no longer thinking of the words coming out of his mouth.

As Havoc possessed none of these talents, Ed was left with the awkward quiet that was broken only by the hum of the engine.

It grew to be too much. "What?"

Havoc looked over at him, a little startled by the sudden question to break the monotony. It took him a moment to regain his thought path, but when he did, Ed realized that he'd opened himself up for a "talk" about his relationship with Roy.

"You know the chief cares about you, don't you?" Havoc asked.

Ed groaned. "Havoc, I really don't want to talk about it."

"I know," Havoc said. "I just wanted to say this. Do you think the chief considers his team friends now?"

"Well, yeah, I suppose so. You come over our house often enough for parties or just to hang out."

"He's never said it, you know that?"

Ed shrugged. "I haven't announced someone as my best friend since Winry when we were kids."

"Do you think he trusts us?" Havoc asked.

"Of course he does," Ed said. "He wouldn't keep you around if he didn't."

"Doesn't say that either." Havoc continued to drive. "The chief talks a lot about the things that aren't important, like getting miniskirts as part of the female uniform. Well, it's definitely important to me. I'd love to see it, but I know it isn't a big issue when compared to relations with Drachma or rebuilding Isbal. He doesn't talk about those things, but he's written letters to other generals in Drachma and donated to the Ishballan reconstruction effort. I haven't seen a single memo about miniskirts." Havoc shrugged. "I don't know if I'm making any sense at all. It's just something I thought I should say."

Ed looked at Havoc. He wasn't always the most articulate in Roy's team and could ramble at times, particularly when he didn't have a cigarette in his hand. Something about the little nicotine sticks calmed the man.

"I know what you mean, and if that was all of it, I wouldn't be in this position," Ed said.

Havoc just nodded.

"So you know, too," Ed said. "Am I the only one who doesn't?"

Havoc opened his mouth, then closed it again, as though thinking better of what he was going to say. "The chief never really came out and told any of us except for Captain Hawkeye and Maes Hughes of course. The rest of us all found out on our own."

Ed nodded. Those two made sense, and if Roy really had only confided in them, Ed might assume it wasn't as bad as his mind had been expecting.

"The rest of us found out because of working with him. And believe it or not, at first, his reasons for not telling you made sense," Havoc said. "I'm not defending beyond when you officially joined the team, but before that, I understand."

Ed looked at him, wanting to ask the other man what it was that Roy was keeping from him that he so willingly told his teammates, but he again closed his mouth. Havoc wouldn't tell him, and he knew it. Just like no one else would tell him.

"This is something for him to tell, Boss." Havoc pulled into the driveway of the house Ed had shared with Roy for the last nine months. Ed looked up at the brick structure with the little green gargoyles on either side of the door.

"Thanks for the ride, Havoc."

"No problem, Boss."

Ed was surprised to find that the house looked completely dark. He'd expected to find Roy home by now. Getting out his key as he heard Havoc drive off, Ed looked around for any sign that the man had been home, but seeing their mail was still in the box next to the door, done in the same style as the gargoyles Ed had purchased, he realized that his lover had not even stopped by the house.

Roy spread out a drawing of a nearly completed transmutation circle on the table. "I understand these symbols, but they seem to be connected the wrong way."

"Sir, I know you insist that he would know what he was drawing, but is it possible he has made a mistake?" Falman asked him.

The brigadier general shook his head. "Absolutely not. Liam knows alchemy, and would be able to at least draw the things that he couldn't do for himself."

Roy began scouring through the books in the unofficially restricted section of the library. When he picked up the unfinished work of the madman Shou Tucker, he felt a shiver run down his spine. He hadn't wanted to actually look through this book because if he could simply find the pieces that inspired Tucker's work, he didn't have to get a glimpse into the bastard's mind.

Roy's hand tightened on the thin covering of the book, as he silently wished his hands were tightening around the other man's throat. How many nightmares had he tried to soothe away because of what Tucker had done? How many times did he wake to the pathetic whimpering of the name Nina? Ed should have been allowed to kill him that night and saved everyone a lot of trouble.

Tucker had cost Roy an important moment, too, that night. He still remembered how reluctant Maes had been to call him out to the scene of Nina's death, how much he hadn't wanted to leave the hospital, and how he'd treated Ed at that moment. Ultimately, though, Roy knew he couldn't go back and get that day back. Instead, all he could do was focus on the present and the black marker drawing of a transmutation circle.

Roy was flipping through Tucker's sketches, trying to ignore the scribbled entries he'd included about his daughter or wife. He wanted to pretend that this had been published without the personal information included. He wanted to pretend there wasn't one copy of this inside of each of the five main alchemy libraries in Amestris and the military hadn't swept Tucker's crimes against humanity under the rug.

He could hear Falman shuffling some papers and returning the books that had proven useless thus far.

"Have you tried talking to the lieutenant colonel about this?" Falman asked.

"He has enough nightmares about this son of a bitch as it is," Roy said. "I will not add to them. Especially when I'm not entirely sure that this is what Liam has drawn."

"But the lieutenant colonel lived in Tucker's house, sir, and he would know better than anyone what these symbols might mean. With the death of his teacher, he is now the only person in the country with that kind of wealth of alchemy in his mind."

"Are you suggesting I use my boyfriend as a reference library?" Roy asked. Falman gathered more books and put them away. He knew that honestly, the older man would likely have done it if their positions were flipped. Ed had knowledge that Falman didn't, and something like that would certainly bother the older man. The only thing that prevented the second lieutenant slash human dictionary from interrogating Ed on all he knew just so that Falman could possess that same information was that Falman didn't understand alchemy. It would be like explaining the finer points of ballet to Ed. He might remember the information, but it would be of no use to him.

Falman hadn't answered, and so Roy continued his search.

However, when Roy saw Falman flipping over the sheet of paper, tracing the design that had bled through from the front, he looked at him curiously.

"Just a theory, sir," the man said. "Though I do not know alchemy, I do enough research."

Roy was then studying a part of Tucker's research, and he saw a transmutation that the other alchemist had not quite managed to complete. He said that putting it on the floor as a traditional transmutation had no effect. Nor did drawing it on the subject—Nina no doubt. Roy knew there was another way, thanks to Zolf Kimblee, and that a person could essentially be tattooed alchemically. That would make it part of the person as Kimblee's symbols had been a part of him.

He glanced up to see what Falman was doing with the transmutation and gasped aloud. It matched the one in the book.

"It was flipped, sir."

"Then maybe it was drawn wrong," Roy said, far too much hope on his face and in his voice. He knew from what he was reading that the slightest alteration would affect the usefulness of the symbol.

"Sir stand up," Falman said. "And put your back to the mirror there."

Roy did as instructed, moving close to, then turning his back to the two-way mirror that the librarians could monitor the room from. With the section being so borderline forbidden, these mirrors were in key locations throughout the room.

"Now, look back at the mirror. I think you were right that Liam wouldn't have gotten it wrong. I think he drew the circle as he saw it, backwards in a mirror."

There were only two symbols missing from the circle to make it complete, which meant...

"I'm going to kill her," Roy said. "I am going to strangle her with my own hands if it is the last thing I do."

When Roy came back to the house, Ed was already in the room, packing his bags. He could hear the older man coming through the door and walking to the library. To the liquor cabinet.

Ed hated when Roy drank, not because he had anything against alcohol. Ed sometimes had a glass of something himself. The problem was that Roy didn't know how to stop with a single glass. When Roy drank, it was usually with the intent of getting completely smashed. The older man swore it helped with the nightmares and self-loathing, but as far as Ed could tell, it only helped the other man forget the nightmares and self-loathing. Ed was lucky enough to deal with the man when he was screaming in the middle of the night or sobbing because he was "a monster."

The young man felt it was wiser if he went downstairs before Roy managed to actually get himself too far gone to hear Ed's conditions. And Ed had them. An ultimatum as well.

He made his way down the stairs and headed to the library. He expected to find Roy already knocking one back, but instead, he found him hunched over the liquor cabinet. One hand was on the piece of furniture; the other was holding the neck of a bottle of scotch.

" Roy?" Ed asked tentatively.

Roy looked up at him. He looked sick, to be honest, and Ed was reconsidering his ultimatum. The man's black eyes were so raw and open. For just a moment, there was the realization that his lover was human. These moments were much to far and few between.

"Oh, sorry, Ed, did I bother you?" And with that, the raw emotion vanished and the mask returned.

Ed shook his head. "You okay, Roy?" he asked, taking a step toward the other man.

"I'm fine," Roy answered so reflexively it was painfully obvious it was an automatic answer. "You can head to bed. I'll be up shortly."

Hearing the word "shortly," Ed flinched, but he managed to keep his composure. Roy hadn't made a genuine short joke in a long time. The blond crossed his arms over his chest. " Roy…"

"I said I'd be up. I won't be down long. I have to be up early tomorrow."

"Right." Ed looked to the floor. "For your train ride to that place you just won't tell me about."

"Ed, don't start." The tone was irritated, but most of all, it was tired.

"Then just tell me." Ed's gold eyes looked up to the older man's face. "It can end in five seconds. Just talk."

"I can't, Ed."

"I want to go with you to wherever it is you're going, Roy. I want to help you if I can." Roy had been a constant over this last year, and Ed feared he'd lost his relationship with Al. It was why he was clinging with nails and teeth to this one.

"Ed, I just can't."

Ed nodded and started to walk away, but then took a shuddering breath before turning his head over his shoulder. " Roy, if you can't at least tell me where you are going tomorrow, let alone take me with you, then I want you to expect me gone when you come back." He turned back to stare ahead of him, waiting for some response from the man behind him. When none came, Ed fought back another shuddered breath and walked away.

He didn't even look to see if Roy had followed.


	4. When the Morning Comes

**Chapter 4**

**When the Morning Comes**

By seven the next morning, Roy Mustang was on a train to East City. He had left a note telling Ed where he would be, but it wouldn't matter. When he returned home, there wasn't a doubt in his mind that Ed would not be there. He rested back against the seat of the train. He'd thought that by going this route, he would have avoided a sleepless night, but he'd gotten little rest between the concern for the young man he'd come to love despite himself and the twisting knot of anticipation of this trip and Liam's welfare.

He had dressed in something casual, fairly comfortable, but he wasn't feeling that at all. The alchemist was shifting around in his seat. He wondered if paying the extra for the nice seat this first time around had actually been worth it. Realistically, he knew he needed to be as well-rested as possible, but it didn't seem to matter where he was, if it had been in one of the packed coach cars or in his current sleeper. He was not going to be getting any real rest, even if his exhaustion from the night before would catch up to him. It would be sleep, but not rest. His mind was not ready for rest.

The major general touched at his eyes and was surprised to find them wet. He wasn't entirely sure for whom his eyes were tearing up. Was it Liam? Karen? Ed? Himself? He just didn't know. Maybe all of them wrapped into one.

Stretching his body across the fold out in the compartment, he sighed. He'd have an ulcer by the time he returned with Liam to Central. If he didn't already have one, which he was almost certain he did.

He groaned, knowing he really could have handled everything so much better, but the time to have done that was long since passed. Ed thought it was last night, but Roy knew better. The words of Ed's ultimatum had boiled down to: tell me or lose me. The truth of it was something very different, but Ed didn't know that. Obviously, he couldn't, or none of this would have been an issue. Roy knew that the truth of Ed's options were: lose me following a long, heated argument or lose me quietly.

Roy had been a coward and taken option two.

He hadn't asked for this, to have someone _fourteen_ years younger than him to befriend him, to pick up where Maes had left off and then some. He hadn't expected Ed to fight at his side during the battle with Drachma, to protect Roy at all costs. How could he have been anything but blindsided by it as they had effortlessly eased into a friendship, one where Roy could openly discuss his latest female—and occasional male—conquest and Ed could rant about his lover?

_It had been sometime around midnight when Ed came to Roy's door, pounding on the thing so hard the older man was certain all that would be left would be red-painted splinters._

_"It is very late, Ed," Roy said, opening the door. "What are you doing?"_

_"James and I split," the young man said, coming into the entrance of Roy's home. It was snowing out, and Ed looked as though he'd been in it all night, the young man's hair was plastered to his face and his cheeks were red from the cold and blowing wind. "I spent the last two damned hours arguing with the son of a bitch." He looked up at Roy. "Your place was closer, and I'm cold."_

_"Can't take the cold?" Roy asked with the ever-present smirk clearly on his face._

_"No more than you can handle the rain, buddy," Ed said, heading to Roy's downstairs bathroom, the smallest of his three. "Cold and two hunks of metal attached to your body just don't mesh."_

_ Roy nodded, having forgotten about that little aspect of Fullmetal._

_Ed chuckled. "You really don't even see them, do you?" he asked. "Don't know if that makes you blind, ignorant or really great." Ed opened the door to Roy's bathroom. "Could I get a hot shower?"_

_"Of course. I'll get you something to change into."_

_Ed thanked him before shutting the door to the bathroom. The older man went upstairs, looking for something he thought might fit the teen. Ed was smaller than Roy in both directions, and it was a near guarantee that if the clothing had any loose threads, they'd catch in the automail._

_Finally, Roy found a set of sweats with a drawstring waist on the pants. He brought them down to the bathroom downstairs and dropped them just inside the door._

_Ed finally came out of the small room and into the kitchen._

_"So, what was it?" Roy asked, already brewing coffee and setting the sugar bowl on the table for Ed, as he would use nearly half of it in his cup._

_"Did you know they've developed silicone covers for automail?" Ed asked. "You just get them molded to fit right over?"_

_"And you're looking into them?" Roy asked._

_"Hell no! But James apparently was. I tried to explain that if I had something covering my automail like that, I'd ruin it the first time I got in a fight. I use the automail as ingredients when I fight." Ed shook his head. "Do you have any idea how many white gloves I go through as it is? Or how often I have to repair the sleeves of my shirt? And these things cost a hundred cenz each, with fifty extra for the first one._

_"Well, that just started a big blow-up about me being in the military, when I wouldn't even let Al join, and he drug up some nasty ass stuff about the way I am with my brother. Yeah, I know it's a shit relationship, but I knew it would happen when I wrote that stuff about Al._

_"Then he actually had the nerve to complain about my nightmares. Said they're the reason he doesn't like to spend a night with me. Like I can control the damned things for my own pleasure and attention-seeking habits! I mean, of the two of us, I sure as hell wasn't the 'drama queen.' He said the nightmares disturbed him and his night's sleep. Well, what the hell did he think they were for me? A walk in the park?"_

_"I'm sorry, Ed," Roy said. He really wasn't because he'd never cared for James much and had always thought the teen deserved better. Maybe even that he could make a much better partner for the blond young man. That thought going through his own head actually managed to shock him so much he almost missed that Ed was still talking._

_Ed shrugged. "Six months I wasted with that halfwit dipshit."_

Roy woke with notification that the dining car was now open for breakfast. Remembering Ed's words, he wondered if the young man would think something similar about their relationship.

Despite his feeling from the very beginning that it would probably end, Roy couldn't see himself considering it wasted time. His eleven months with Ed had been nerve-wracking, crazy, passionate and meaningful.

0o0o0o0

Ed stretched as he woke. He'd actually slept the whole night curled in a ball on his side of the bed. His whole body ached. As he rose from the bed, Ed was determined to curse his older lover not only for the fact that his body hurt, but for his throbbing headache.

Looking at his side of the bed, the young man was surprised to see the fact that very little was disturbed on his portion of the bed he loved so much. He hadn't moved, despite the fact that Ed had a tendency to take up a huge portion of the king-sized mattress.

He began to make the bed and couldn't help but noticed Roy's side. It appeared that the only person to ever share the older man's bed had been alone in it last night. Ed folded his arms and frowned. He had wished that Roy might have at least managed to sleep with him last night, that there might be some sign of hope for them.

Ed shook his head and walked away from the bed, noticing that there was something taped to the bathroom door. His stomach lurched as he neared the piece of paper and the door. His feet made just the faintest uneven sound on the floor, the dullest tone of the pat, thunk that his normal gait sounded elsewhere. Finally reaching the door, he lifted an unsteady hand to snatch the paper down from its place so that he could read it.

"Ed, Left at 6 a.m. Will be back in about a week. Roy."

Ed crumpled the paper in his hand, then pitched it as far away as he possibly could manage. It didn't matter that there was a wastepaper basket at his feet. He pitched it to the dresser at the side of the room, which it rolled under, far out of his sight. Ed hit the hardwood door with his right fist. He managed to knock a few splinters in the door, but had not hit it hard enough to actually destroy the thing.

"That damned bastard!" Ed growled out to no one. Roy hadn't even acknowledged their argument or anything that the young man had said the night before. "Where the hell does he get off?"

Ed stormed around the bedroom for some time, too angry to actually go into the bathroom to take care of the usual morning routines. He deserved something that wasn't more formal than Riza Hawkeye writing a duty report. He couldn't believe the man had actually omitted a single word, let alone an apology, about last night. Ignoring it wouldn't make it go away. He had to know that.

And then, Ed froze, eyes wide, and hands no longer clasped in fists at his sides. The strands that had pulled loose through the night swung in opposite directions from the long ponytail where they belonged. By saying nothing, Roy had actually acknowledged their argument. The note was to inform Ed just how long he had to follow through on his ultimatum. Roy was avoiding the subject of last night because he recognized it as the end of their relationship.

Ed fell back on the bed, sitting on the top of the low footboard. Roy still didn't trust him enough to tell him why he was going, and expected Ed to leave. But the young man didn't want to. He wanted to stay. He wanted to find out what it was that Roy felt he had to keep a secret from him. It was obvious that just wasn't going to happen.

Looking back at his relationship with James, the civilian librarian, or even the brief fling with the warrant officer who worked with Falman, Ed knew he wouldn't have tolerated this from either of them. Roy obviously didn't trust him, and it killed Ed. There was a possibility that the man was cheating on him with someone else, and Roy at least knew that was what Ed suspected. He'd never argued that it wasn't the case even to ease the young man's mind. But Ed kept mentally defending him, even when he didn't know why.

"Because I still love the son of a bitch," Ed said. He'd known it for a long time, and he felt certain that Roy had felt the same way about him. After all, why would he have let Ed move in with him just two months into their relationship because the military would not let the then newly-appointed lieutenant colonel live in the dorms with the enlisted men.

_Ed opened the door to Roy's bedroom and headed over to the large, soft-looking bed. He made his way across the room, his uneven footsteps muffled by the thick carpeting._

_"Even the floor in this room would be more comfortable than that guest bed," he muttered to himself. He could see Roy shifting in his bed. Ed didn't really want to wake him, but if he did, the man would deserve it for putting him in that awful guest bed. Reaching the bed, he pulled the covers down and climbed into the unoccupied half of the bed._

_"Ed…" Roy croaked. "What are you doing here?"_

_"Sleeping. That bed in the other room isn't fit to sleep on."_

_"It's supposed to be that way," Roy said, sitting up. The man's black hair was sticking out at odd directions. In the dark, the clear whites of his bleary eyes stood out. "I don't like for anyone to spend the night. It only gets a few hours of use when someone's here."_

_"You gave me your sex bed?" Ed asked, looking over, indignantly at the older man."_

_"Maybe," Roy said. "I don't like people sharing my bed with me."_

_"Well, get used to it. You're going to have it happen today, buddy." Ed relaxed against the pillow, and he waited for Roy to argue with him._

_"Goodnight, Ed," he said, much to the younger man's surprise._

_"Goodnight, Roy."_

Ed stood and headed back to the bathroom, starting the shower. He knew the instant he climbed inside, he would probably begin crying, as he had during his travels with his brother. It was the best way to hide the sound to the brother in the armor who seemed to know all. It was the easiest possible way to ensure that Al didn't see all of Ed's weaknesses or uncertainty.

Ed then remembered his brother. Poor Al, coming back to Central when this was Ed's state of mind. The older brother shook his head. Here, Al was coming back with the possibility of repairing the rift Ed had intentionally created between them and the blond was in the middle of breaking up with his lover.

And somewhere between the remorse for what he had done to keep Al from getting into the military where he didn't belong and realizing that his relationship with Roy definitely was over, Ed broke down and cried long before he made it in the shower.


	5. Liam

**Chapter 5**

**Liam**

After two days on the train, Roy was grateful for the fresh air of East City. He stretched his legs and arms before heading to the vehicle rental area just outside of the train station. He wondered if Ed was still in the house, if the young man had any other options than to stay there. Roy could only imagine how awkward it would be if Ed couldn't find another place.

Really, Roy knew better, knew that Ed would have another option. He had friends, made them easier, it seemed than Roy had in years. He was also a very attractive man still in his younger years. He had no marks on his face as Roy did, and people were accepting automail better than ever before. Really, there was no reason to doubt that Ed would find himself a place to stay.

If nothing else, Ed had most of Roy's team on his side. Really, the older man knew why they would side with Ed. All of them, at one point or another, had learned exactly what the man was keeping from his lover, and he couldn't think of one of them really approving of the fact that he was doing it. But by the time Ed was in a position to learn it the way they had, Liam had learned discretion. Being older probably had a lot to do with it.

Roy headed through the train station, getting his bags checked at a locker there. On the way, he passed a woman who knew Karen, knew of Roy, and disliked what she knew of the man. He did his best to disregard her looks, just as he always did. He did this trip to East City at least six times a year, staying for nearly a week each time. He had grown accustomed to the looks of disappointment and disgust. Admittedly, some of the things in his dealings with Liam earned the looks, but he felt that Karen was the far more deserving candidate.

The man went through the station and out to the vehicle rental area. He knew he had to reserve the car for the entire day, though he really would only need it for a few hours. He knew that it would look suspicious enough that he wasn't renting one for his usual week. He simply couldn't risk it getting to Karen why he was really there.

In the interest of time, he did his best not to get caught up in a long conversation with the man who ran the rental place. Morris was a talker, and Roy simply didn't have time for it. It seemed a shame, because if things went the way he hoped they would, he would be seeing Morris hardly ever again. He didn't consider the elderly man a friend, per se, but he had enjoyed being around the genial man.

While Roy would miss the people like the man who was currently in the process of finding him a good car for the day, he wouldn't miss the frowns and looks of disgust at him from people like the women earlier.

Roy sighed and thanked Morris for the car before climbing in and heading to the school where he could speak to Dr. Karlsen. He owed at least that to the woman. She had been good about contacting him and keeping him updated when it seemed that he had no way of knowing. He owed the woman a face to face meeting at the very least.

He started the car and drove down the far more developed streets of the city, glancing at East Headquarters, where he'd once had an office before he became part of Central's core officers. That was back before he was sure that those in parliament seeking the position of prime minister were planning to make him head of their military department. He'd already been approached, subtly, by more than one aspiring politician.

He continued to drive along the streets that seemed to change more and more with each visit. East City was growing more and more each year it seemed. That was largely due to Ed.

Karen criticized Roy's lover often enough—until he confirmed otherwise, he couldn't bring himself to think of Ed as his ex just yet.—but realistically, East City would never have been what it was if it hadn't been for the young man. Passing by the somewhat exaggerated statue of him in the central hub of the town, it seemed that the town recognized what the woman would not. Ed had done a lot to improve relations with the Ishballans and had even begun a formal relationship with Xing through studies in the country's alchemy. East City had become a hub for international trade, and it was all thanks to the young man that Karen liked to disparage so often.

Perhaps Karen would have felt differently if she was a native of the eastern border as Roy had been. She had been born nearly as far west as Roy had been born in the east, and it was just one more personality quirk that had explained why they were so often opposed to one another.

Driving onward, Roy took one final glance at the statue of Ed. It was far too stylized and idealistic, and yet in the same breath, did not do the young man justice. Roy had, perhaps, grown accustomed to the less idealistic, more flawed version of the blond. He had learned to love each outburst, every self-satisfied grin, every scar that this small—though much larger than the real thing—statue would never show.

_"Damn it, __Roy__," the teen said. "Hands off."_

_"I'm sorry," he said, pulling away. "I just had no idea that there were so many."_

_Ed groaned. "Yeah, well, you don't see me poking underneath of that patch you still insist on wearing. Don't know who you think you're fooling." __Roy__ looked up at him._

_"Again, I'm sorry. I don't know what came over me," __Roy__ said as he tried to sew the tear in Ed's pants._

_The blond huffed. "Don't you have the sweatpants I wore last time?"_

_"Can't find them," __Roy__ lied. "And I won't be long."_

_"I still want to know where you learned to sew."_

_"Being part of the regular military for a while, or at least the academy, you learn some basic things. They want you to be self-sufficient."_

_"Yeah, yeah," Ed said, pacing the room in the pair of briefs and long black tanktop. "In other words don't rely on your C.O. slash friend."_

_Roy__ smiled up at him. The young man looked very good, walking around like that, though he wanted to internally smack himself for that quick little move to touch the long scars at the top of Ed's thighs._

_"You want to tell me why you're looking at me like you're a hungry tiger and I'm your next meal?" Ed asked with a smirk._

_Roy__ gaped for a moment. Since when did Ed become perceptive, and smug, of all things? "Perhaps because I'm interested on taking you out somewhere that doesn't involve the rest of the team."_

_"A date?" Ed asked, and Roy expected him to laugh, but the blond turned very serious. "Fine, but on one condition. I want to look at all of your face." Ed thought a moment. "Two conditions. You pay."_

0o0o0o0

For the second time that day, Ed was repacking his belongings into boxes and suitcases. It was now the third day, including the morning of Roy's note, and he was still trying to force himself to follow through with his ultimatum. It was just… he didn't want to.

Ed knew he deserved better. He didn't have that feeling of unworthiness that drove him absolutely mad with Roy's ego. He knew that he deserved a relationship with someone who wouldn't try to change him, someone who understood him, someone who trusted him. And in cases like this, two out of three just wasn't going to cut it, even if he loved him.

Why did the man have to be so damned difficult? So stubborn? If he had just told Ed… well, maybe they would still be over, but at least there would be the slightest chance. Despite how messed up Roy was when it came to them both, Ed just couldn't bring himself to believe that Roy really did want it to end like this.

There was a knock to the front door, and Ed immediately rushed downstairs, thinking it must be Al finally back from Risembool. He quickly glanced in the mirror to make sure that he didn't look like he'd been crying. He seemed to be doing that a lot lately. He had taken two weeks off, including the last few days. Aside from going through the house and dividing up his things, he hadn't really done anything, but he felt completely exhausted.

He hoped it didn't show, though he knew that, even if it didn't, Al would be able to tell like he always could.

The young man opened the front door.

"Where do you want it?" A large man asked.

Ed blinked a few times, seeing another man to match the first was leaning against a large cardboard box. "Want what?" Ed asked, still at a loss.

"The bed," the man said as though Ed was the biggest idiot in the entire world.

"I didn't order a bed," Ed said, still confused. "Do you have the right house?"

"Twin bed ordered under the name Roy Mustang."

Ed stared up at the man. "The only place for it is the first door on the right upstairs."

The two men nodded, still looking at Ed as though he was stupid.

Then again, he probably looked the part at the moment, as he was standing with his fists clenched and a look of surprise and anger on his face. Roy had bought a bed? For what?

Did he think Ed would just sleep in that while Roy continued in his place in their bed? It might have been Roy's first, but Ed felt that it was now as much his as the older man's.

"Son of a bitch," Ed muttered to himself.

_Roy handed him the oil, and Ed stared at him for a good fifteen, twenty seconds. "You're serious?"_

_The man lay there, staring up at Ed. The dark eyes rolled. "Do I look like I am joking?" He gestured to the raging hard-on that he was sporting._

_"You're a bottom?" Ed asked him._

_"I like the feeling of prostate stimulation," __Roy__ said in a voice so sterile, it nearly made the young man laugh himself simple._

_"Kill the mood, why don't you?" Ed asked. "You know, there are a million other ways of putting it. You could say that you enjoy the feeling of another man inside of you." He leaned down and nipped at __Roy__'s neck. "Or that you are an attention hog who likes to be taken care of?" He kissed __Roy__'s cheek. "Or that you just like being pounded into a mattress?"_

_"I wonder if a runt like you could actually pound me into anything," __Roy__ said._

_With a near-feral growl, Ed chose to prove him wrong._

"Brother?" a voice said, waking Ed from his memories. "Brother? Are you okay?" Ed looked up at saw Al, standing at the doorway. "The door was standing wide open."

"Oh… Delivery men," Ed said, trying to dismiss the problem that the men's presence had started. He shook his head lightly, walking over to Al's side. "So… Al, how are you?"

"The train ride went fine," Al said. "Brother, what's wrong?"

Ed shook his head and put on a smile. "Nothing's wrong, Al." He moved closer to his little—well, not literally—brother and suddenly felt awkward. Considering their history, he wasn't sure if he should shake his hand or hug him… if he should do anything at all. He was still quite amazed that his little brother would actually talk to him again, and finding him standing before him had Ed more than at a loss.

"You're not telling the truth," Al said. Though it was obviously an accusation, there was none of the meanness or bitterness in his voice that Ed would have expected, that Ed would have certainly had in his own if their roles had been reversed. There were loud thumps upstairs and Al's eyes were diverted toward the source of the sound. "Brother?"

The sheer concern in the large brown eyes was eating at Ed. Despite himself, he said his thoughts aloud. "How can you act so normal?"

Al looked as surprised by Ed's little outburst as the blond, himself, was. Ed nearly smacked himself as Al's expressive eyes—no surprise he'd be so easy to read now, as he had been even in his armor—flashed so many different emotions that Ed knew he couldn't begin to catalogue them all. The surprise was definitely there, but there was also hurt, anger, frustration, pity…

Ed could only manage shame.

"I… Ed," Al started. "You're my brother. You look like you haven't slept in days." He put his suitcase down. "No matter what, I'm going to worry about you. What is it?"

There were dozens of things that could have come out of Ed's mouth, ranging from the lack of trust to suspicious behavior of the older man. What came out, however, was "Bastard bought me a bed."

Al's light brown brows met and he looked at Ed as though he'd grown a third head. With a sigh, Ed began to explain, only pausing when the other men made trips for the mattress, box springs, and finally to leave.

0o0o0o0

"Liam's behavior has been subdued lately. And that has us concerned," the gray-haired woman said, after having listed off a number of worries about Roy's main priority in coming to East City. "And he has been frightening other students with the stories he has been telling."

"Truth be told," the mousy man to Dr. Karlsen's left said, "he has been scaring some of the teachers too."

"If this were a case of a young, active imagination," she continued as though the teacher had not spoken, "we may have just dealt with this on our own, but it's not just Liam who has changed."

Roy nodded. "Karen has been combative at best since I was forced to cut her research budget." He looked the older woman in the eye. "I can't really explain the reason, but there was no option, and as I've been put in charge of the state alchemists… well, it fell to me to do."

The woman nodded. She was the principal of a school. Of course she understood difficult decisions as a person of authority.

"Well, Major General," the woman said, standing and holding out her hand, "good luck with them both, and please, keep us updated."

Roy nodded and shook her hand. "Thank you, and I will."

Saying his goodbyes to the woman and to the teacher, he headed toward Karen's home. He knew from Liam's letters that the woman would be her personal lab by this time of day. Still, he quietly drove the car up to the front of the house. Thankfully, his presence wasn't so unheard of that the neighbors would immediately contact Karen to notify her he was there.

He glanced up just in time to see a head of dark black hair disappear from a window. In just a few moments, he watched as the back door was opened.

Roy stepped from the car and watched as the little boy with his shaggy black hair and almond-shaped brown eyes came running through the back yard. He was much too thin, in Roy's opinion and looked far too relieved to see him. The older man preferred when Liam looked happy to greet him. This look on his face clearly said that the boy considered Roy his savior.

"Daddy!" he yelled out before throwing his arms around the military man.


	6. Father

**Chapter 6  
**

_**Father**_

Ed had never really broke down in front of his brother, but when he'd gone upstairs and finally saw that damned little bed, he just couldn't help it. He wanted to destroy the little pine bed with its blue mattress and set of "complimentary" white sheets. He wanted to just rip it all to shreds, send the springs flying, but he couldn't.

He couldn't because every time he threatened to, Al grabbed him and held his arms to the sides. Really, with Ed's automail, there was no logical reason why his younger brother should still be able to do this now that he was flesh and blood, but he could. He could and he did it with ease. And when Ed finished ranting and raving, struggling to free himself from his brother's bear-like grip, he finally started to cry again.

It started because he realized that a tiny, almost insignificant part of him wanted to hope that the bed was a misunderstanding and Roy would come back home, telling Ed that the company had delivered the wrong thing. That all of this secretive behavior had been because he was getting something for Ed, though another part of his brain argued Ed really had no need for anything from a furniture store.

"What do I do?" Ed asked his brother. "I have to leave, but I don't want to."

Al turned him and held Ed the way their mother used to do. He even began rubbing his back, making Ed feel like the biggest heel in the world. He wanted to tell Al that he'd given him a poor recommendation in his permanent record to protect him. His little brother wasn't a killer, and if Ed could keep it that way, he would.

But Al would argue with him and try to convince Ed to change his permanent record again, to allow him to join. The thing was that Ed, in his state of mind now, would probably give in, just to make Al happy and ensure that he didn't lose one more person now that the person who'd kept him sane over the last few years of near silence from Al.

Now, with Ed here and Roy gone, Ed didn't think he could manage to do or say anything that might make him lose Al again.

0o0o0o0

"Dad," Liam said, looking up at the man. At nearly eight, he was varying more between the two forms of his name for Roy, "how come you're here? I thought that you had to stay in Central for another month." Roy lifted his son, knowing it shouldn't still be this easy to carry the boy.

"I'm here because I'm going to take you to Central with me."

"Mom won't like that," Liam said, with the slightest flash of fear in his brown eyes.

"Maybe not," Roy said, "but I want to keep you with me from now on."

"So the people, the ones that you thought might hurt me, they're gone?" Liam asked, his arms wrapped around his father's neck.

Roy had been as honest with the boy as he could. Between the danger Liam was in because of the fuhrer and then the fuhrer's supporters after the homunculus's death, he had been forced to keep Liam as close to a secret as possible. He had told Liam honestly when he was about five why Liam couldn't come to Central with him.

"They're gone now," Roy confirmed. "And you are going to come to Central with me. You'll get to pick out what you want your new room to look like, and I've already ordered you a brand new bed of your own."

Liam squeezed Roy's neck tighter to hug him and hold on at the same time. "Thank you, Daddy."

The sheer gratitude in his son's voice made Roy's heart ache. What had Karen been doing to the boy? "I'm going to need you to go in the house and get the things you want most. Okay, buddy?"

"Can Ed come?"

Roy stopped for a minute and looked at the little boy. Ed? But Ed was in Central, probably already trying to find another place to stay. Maybe even destroying a good portion of Roy's home. Why would Ed come?

"I can't take my cat?" Liam asked in a way that made Roy thankful that the boy was past the age of pouting.

"Do you have a carrier for him?" Roy asked.

"Yeah. For when we take him to the vet," Liam answered. "Mom hates taking him though. He said the expense for him is your fault since you gave him to me. She doesn't like his name anymore either."

No, Roy guessed not, but he'd only named him Ed because the finicky little thing had been part of his bet with the teen, and he reminded Roy a little of him.

"Can we take his bed too?" Liam asked. "I really like the bed."

Roy nodded. The bed, he imagined, had been Ed's design to console Al. He knew the younger brother didn't want to leave the cat behind without a home. "Don't worry about too many clothes," Roy said. "I will get you new ones."

Liam nodded as Roy put him back on the ground. "Does this mean I don't ever have to come back?"

"It means you never, ever have to come back."

Liam grinned. He was missing two of his teeth, it seemed, since Roy last saw him. "Do I have to… go in alone?"

"How are you going to be able to carry all of that by yourself, silly?" Roy asked, trying to keep the tone light. "I'm going in with you. But you're going to have to handle Ed. I don't think he likes me much."

Liam nodded and headed into the house. Roy watched as he followed behind. He wished the only change in his son were the two baby teeth missing and the added inch or so in height. Those were natural, not like the dark circles beneath the dusting of freckles on his cheeks.

He passed by the basement door, which Roy knew led to Karen's laboratory. She was muttering to herself as she worked, it seemed. And as long as her voice was louder than they were, he hoped he would not have to face her. He was about to tell Liam to be quiet, but it seemed his son had noticed him opening his mouth to speak and had raised a single finger to his thin little lips.

"Shh…"

Roy nodded and headed up the stairs to his son's room, passing by his son's sole companion, as of late. Ed only looked up at him and growled quietly, but didn't seem to have the energy for his regular hiss and attack—thank goodness the obnoxious thing was declawed. He had to wonder if even Liam's cat had become part of whatever experiments Karen was performing.

He knew the woman was bitter and didn't have a single good word to say about him, but why she would take this out on her son and his pet, he didn't know.

0o0o0o0

_Roy__, listen," Maes's voice said from the other line, "you know that I, more than anyone, wouldn't ask you to miss that, but… there's been an incident."_

_Roy__ could hear Karen screaming from the other room. He was being called various names that were even more inventive than she managed when she found out she was pregnant. "It damned well better be big, Maes."_

_"It involves Edward Elric. Military police just arrived at Shou Tucker's place, the sick fuck," Maes said. __Roy__ was shocked to hear his friend use a word he'd only heard once or twice from the older man's lips. "He used his daughter to make a chimera, __Roy__, and Ed reacted. Hit him a few times."_

_"Good for him," __Roy__ said._

_"That's not all, Roy. Ed is making a scene because he doesn't understand how this military works. He wants to save the girl, and the military—"_

_"Wants to study her," __Roy__ completed for him._

_"It could cost him his job in the military. Maybe even lead to dishonorable discharge and investigation. __Roy__, this could cost him." Maes had a good indication of what Ed and Al had done, thanks to __Roy__'s own studies into human transmutation. If the military investigated those two boys, it would mean their lives, even his career. He needed to be there for his child's birth, but he also needed to ensure he could provide for the baby after he or she was born. "I'll be there. I'll take care of the situation."_

0o0o0o0

There was a knock at the front door.

"Brother, let me get it," Al said.

Ed shook his head. "No, I've got it. Besides, it isn't like it's going to be another damned bed." He went to the door and opened it, finding Jean Havoc standing there. "Did the bastard send you?" Ed asked, immediately.

Havoc shook his head. "I came because I heard he hadn't told you before he left and that you probably wouldn't want to stay here."

"Did you think he'd offer you a spare room or something?" Ed asked, though his suspicious little mind was thinking more along the lines of offering Havoc Ed's space in bed.

"No," he said. "I've got a place of my own." His blue eyes narrowed. "And a love life of my own that involves only women." He started to flick his cigarette away.

"Don't bother. For at least another few days, this is my place too, and if the bastard doesn't like the smell of cigarettes, let him deal with it. Come in," Ed said. He stood to the side and folded his arms, looking up at the first lieutenant.

Havoc must have caught sight of Ed's bags, because he immediately looked back at the young man and asked, "So you're leaving him?"

"Of course I'm leaving him. The son of a bitch bastard didn't even talk to me before he left. He just left a damned note telling me he'd gone."

"Where are you going?" Havoc asked, releasing a puff of smoke.

"I… I don't know, but I'll find a place," Ed said, determinedly. "I mean, just because I can't go to the dorms doesn't mean I can't find someplace."

"Hotels can get pretty pricey, Boss, and apartments are hard to find."

Ed took a few quick strides to the older man and pointed his index finger into Havoc's face. "If you think I am going to just stay here after he's been keeping something from me—"

"I have a spare room," Havoc said, not flinching.

"Are you offering it to Ed?" Al said from the doorway.

Havoc quickly turned his head, brushing the tip of his cigarette against Ed's automail hand. "Hey, watch it!" Ed yelled. "That could have been my real hand you know."

"But it wasn't," Havoc responded back, unfazed in a very un-Havoc-like manner.

"Have you been taking lessons or something from Hawkeye?" Ed asked, but was ignored.

"Al? You're here?" He went over and shook Al's hand, receiving a half-hug from the taller teen. "When did you get in?"

"Just a few hours ago. I've already heard about everything," he said. "So, are you offering my brother to stay with you?"

"I don't want to smell like cigarette smoke," Ed said, almost immediately, wondering why he said it. He had never cared about that in the past. _But __Roy__ did,_ his mind supplied.

"It isn't allowed in the complex. The smoke detectors are very sensitive." He shrugged. "So if you want to… The room's there. You can say it's temporary until you figure out something better if you want. You'd still have to help with rent, though."

Ed's eyes narrowed. "Are you asking me because you _need_ help with rent?"

Havoc chuckled. "I'm asking you because you're in a shitty position and I think we're friends."

With a single bob of his head, Ed agreed.

"Let me know when you want to start moving in. I'll have to clear out the room first. My last roommate was Breda. So you can kinda imagine what it looks like."

Ed twisted his face up at the thought. He was disorganized, but clean. Breda was… a slob.

"Well, anyway," Havoc said. "I'll start clearing out the room, if you want to make sure you've got everything you want to take with you. And Al, you're welcome to my sofa. It pulls out, though you might have to fight with Kain if he gets in another fight with Shezka."

Al chuckled and nodded. "I understand."

Ed just headed upstairs, prepared to finish packing his things, even if he didn't want to do it.

0o0o0o0

Roy helped Liam up the high steps to the train. His legs were getting longer, but it was still a little bit of a struggle for him.

"And you're sure they'll take good care of Ed?" he asked.

"Very good care of him," Roy said, mussing Liam's straight black hair. "Come on kiddo, this way to our compartment."

"I still wish he didn't have to ride in the back with the luggage."

"I know, but you'll be able to see him first thing when we get off in Central, and he has plenty of food and water to get him through the train ride.

Liam nodded and headed down the narrow aisle to their room as Roy kept a hand on his little boy's shoulder.

"Dad, what did Mrs. Jonas mean when she said it was about time I stayed with you?"

Roy opened the door to the sleeper he'd reserved for them both, where their luggage was already waiting. "Well, she thinks I should have taken you to stay with me at least for a few weeks a long time ago, but she doesn't understand that I was trying to keep you safe."

Unfortunately, Roy was sure that even at that he had failed. He shut the compartment door, almost to terrified to see Karen or police officials bursting onto the train to really even speak to Liam. He stood at the tiny window and waited for the train to leave and give him the head start he needed. He'd already called Riza to let her know he was on his way, so she would file all the paperwork for the custody hearing. The question now on Roy's mind was whether or not Falman had been right in the library, but he didn't want to start off with those questions now. He had a two and a half day train ride to find out.

He saw to his left as Liam happily flopped down on one of the sofa's. "I've never been on a train before," he said. "Not that I can remember."

Roy took a seat next to him, hearing the whistle sounding to signal the train was leaving the station. "I know," he said, running a hand over Liam's hair. "Your mom was transferred from Central right after you were born."

Liam nodded. "You were transferred when I was little, too," he said.

"Yes. I went to East Headquarters, and then went back to Central when you were about four."

"I liked that. I got to see you all the time," Liam said. He leaned against Roy, who braced him as the train started. "And I'll get to see Lt. Hawkeye, Lt. Breda, Lt. Havoc and Sgt. Fuery again."

Roy nodded. "And you'll get to meet Lt. Falman. But Hawkeye is a captain now and Fuery is a lieutenant."

"And you're a major general," Liam said, his brown eyes gleaming with pride as he smiled up at his dad. Roy leaned down and kissed him on his forehead. He was still surprised each day he spent with his son how naturally loving him came.

0o0o0o0

_"I yelled at him, Maes," __Roy__ said when he returned to the private birthing facility. "He was crying, absolutely horrified by what he'd seen, and rightly so, and I yelled at him." He looked in at the tiny baby in the blue blanket. "How the hell am I supposed to be a father when I took out my anger at the military on a kid today?" He'd been so furious, not only with the military for what they'd done with Tucker, but because it had taken him away from one of the most important moments in his life._

_"You told him what he needed to be told, you know," Maes said. "He's in the military now, __Roy__. He has to know how this all works."_

_"And do you know why he's in the military? Why a twelve-year-old joined a grown man's military? Because I let him. Some shit like me could come along in twelve years and let him" He pointed to his son behind the glass. "join, maybe kill or at least see death himself."_

_"This whole thing changes your perspective, __Roy__, you know that. Maybe now, you wouldn't offer Ed a position in the military. But he'd have joined anyway. Under someone like Basque Gran, maybe? Or perhaps that schmuck Archer in Southern command? Roy, he's here, he probably would be regardless of what you did. But you can protect him, watch over him. Be responsible like you'd want the man watching over your son to be responsible."_

_Roy__ looked over at him and nodded. He was right. That prodigy would have been discovered by the military at one point or another, and at the hope of getting his brother's body back, he'd have joined._

_Maes's arm wrapped around __Roy__ as he rested his forehead against the cold surface. "How am I going to do this, Maes?"_

_"You'll do fine, __Roy_

_"You saw what I did with Ed." Once more, he was back on that subject._

_"Well, surprisingly enough, most kids come in much smaller packages. To let you get accustomed to them before their teenage years."_

_Roy__ just sighed as he again looked at the sleeping bundle in the room just beyond._


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7**

_**Is There Love?**_

Roy woke to an unceremonious knee to his stomach. Liam had gotten frightened in the night, and Roy had moved the boy to sleep with him, and his son remained curled up against him. They just had a short while until they were in Central, and the alchemist felt he had more than enough knowledge to ensure he didn't lose his son.

Much to his own fear, he'd found that Falman had been right about the markings on Liam's back. The same drawing they had seen in Liam's letter had been backwards because the boy could only see it in a mirror. And it was nearly complete. Just one symbol remained from the one he'd found in Shou Tucker's notes.

He cursed Karen for using this on their son, a transmutation circle to create chimeras, and furious at the military for sweeping the darker aspects of Tucker's research in order to cover up a potential dark mark on the military's already dark past. There were no restrictions against the study and practice of Tucker's work because the military knew that deeming it anything but a beneficial scientific endeavor would open the can of worms of Lab 5 and Nina Tucker.

Roy looked down at his son and ran a hand through the straight black hair. Roy could see that all those years of trying to pretend to a majority of the world that he didn't have Liam were absolutely pointless. The seven-year-old was looking more and more like the alchemist every day, save for the milk and honey, freckled complexion and brown eyes he inherited from Karen. Every feature was a mirror of Roy's and it would have only taken a chance meeting with someone who wanted to hurt Roy to have put the boy in danger.

He hadn't counted on a not-so-chance encounter.

Roy didn't understand how Karen could do this to their son. Sure, she could be vindictive when it came to not getting her way or the possibility of losing her state alchemist title—this was the second time in Liam's lifetime she'd been close to losing it all together—but he'd never anticipated that she could be capable of hurting their son. There was no doubt in the man's mind that part of the reason she kept Liam rather than aborting him was as a way of ensuring some favors from Roy, but not once had the man questioned her love for the frightened child now trying to carve a hole in Roy just to get closer to him.

Roy sighed and rested his chin atop Liam's head as the boy's hands fisted in his shirt.

He knew he'd need to check the cat next. He had a suspicious feeling that Liam's Ed had been the other victim in Karen's… was it revenge? Or was it genuine research?

They'd first met over a conversation about how the military just wasn't funding her current research. As a water alchemist, she was working on ensuring there were water sources available to all towns within Amestris. It was good work, benevolent work, which meant the old administration had no interest in it at all.

In talking to one another as, really, only two alchemists can, Roy and Karen slept together on more than one occasion, one of which resulted in Liam. They had both been happy with now marrying, and Karen had seemed to understand why Roy wanted Liam to stay a secret.

However, Karen also realized that she now had an easy way to manipulate the lieutenant colonel. She said that it was all well and good that he wanted to care for the boy, but he wouldn't be able to send regular checks to ensure that Liam had a comfortable life, and as she seemed destined to lose her title as a state alchemist, she wasn't sure how she could provide for him.

It had been a not-so-subtle hint at Roy to get her the research support she needed.

Roy then had to try to prove to the fuhrer and the rest of the higher ranking officers why Major Tyler deserved to be given a grant for her research. He was certain there were those who suspected some of it boiled down to the birth of the woman's child, but at the time, no one could prove with certainty that Liam was his. It wasn't until two years ago that Roy's name had officially appeared on the boy's birth certificate.

So, Karen was granted her work, through Roy's persuasion of the powers that be, and the country benefited from it.

That was all well and good then, but Karen's timing on her research was never very good, and this same process repeated itself with a new administration and a new research idea.

_"I'm going to lose my state alchemy license, Roy," she said, looking at him pleadingly as they drank coffee in her house. Roy was all-too-familiar with the look in her eyes, that false begging she did so well._

_"Then you need to find something that this administration is interested in supporting, Karen," he said, taking a drink of the coffee. "They are working very hard on diplomacy, convincing the rest of the world that our country isn't solely focused on warfare. The creation of a bomb that no one else has and could possibly spread radiation throughout the world just isn't quite the new administration's cup of tea, I'm afraid."_

_"The hydrogen bomb would—"_

_"Would be something that even the old administration was afraid of. Edward and Alphonse Elric, I believe, destroyed the original prototype some time ago." He set his cup down on the table and looked at her. She was pacing, and he could see her chocolate eyes trying to find a reason for him to help her in this._

_"This bomb would guarantee our safety. We could work on it in secret. Have it as a back-up." She was getting agitated. It was obvious in her voice. Karen had always been an overachiever like Roy, but had never gone the officer pathway._

_"The only way it ensures our safety," Roy said calmly, "is if the world knows we have it. If the world knows we have it, we will once again be considered a hostile force in the world. Keeping it a secret does not ensure us safety. We could still be attacked, Karen. Then we use the bomb, and the radiation would spread gradually to us. If the world knows, they will begin recruiting alchemists to design it for themselves, since have already set the bar for it."_

_"You sound like a typical officer," she accused. "What happened to the alchemist? The man who delved in the realm of hypotheticals?"_

_"He became a father and saw what some of the hypotheticals do to people he cared about," Roy said, harshly. "If you want to pursue this, then do it, but the only support you receive from me will be child support."_

She'd lost her funding six months ago, and had another six before her license as a state alchemist was revoked. The state thought it kinder that way, to let state alchemists prove themselves without the funding, rather than cutting them off altogether once they had failed to prove their usefulness for some time. For Karen, it seemed to have created a madness, that loss of status and power that Roy knew she craved as much as he once had—still did at times, when he was being honest with himself.

"Twenty minutes until Central Station," someone yelled outside.

Roy knew he'd have to wake his son, and hoped the person he'd see waiting for him was Riza and not armed officers.

0o0o0o0

Ed sat on the bed he'd been sleeping in for nearly a year. He was all packed up, had even begun setting up his room at Havoc's. He'd be back to a twin bed like the one now in the spare bedroom. He looked around the room and felt seriously like breaking something. Maybe everything, and then taking away one or two crucial pieces so Roy couldn't transmute them back together.

He'd leave the bed because, despite everything, he knew it belonged to Roy's parents, and even in the rage he currently found himself in, he was not that cruel to take something from the man of the parents he'd lost years ago.

Still, he was feeling malicious, if not the slightest bit petty, so he transmuted his arm and slashed through Roy's precious down pillows that he could "only get in a shop outside of Eastern Headquarters," which he proceeded to scatter through the room. He sighed. It was ridiculously petty, even sounded more like something a girl would do—he cringed at the thought—but as he stood amidst the feathers falling like snow he knew it was too late.

"Do you have everything, Brother?" Al asked from downstairs.

"Yeah, just the stuff in the bathroom's left now." He headed into the bathroom and got his toothbrush, comb, shampoo, all the stuff he used that Roy didn't. Funny, he thought as he took away whatever hair products he had, even with all of his items gone, there didn't seem to be a dent in the groupings on the sinktop and medicine cabinet.

"Man always was a prima donna," he muttered, putting the items into a cardboard box. Then again, Ed hadn't seen all of this junk, at least he thought it was, the first few times he visited him. He didn't seem to put the effort into his appearance for a while there. Come to think of it, a lot of it mysteriously appeared after Ed told him he looked good without the eyepatch. It was only a scarred cheekbone and some scarring on the lids. Roy was a good-looking man, so what did he think a little scar would do?

Ed didn't want to think about the implications that maybe all of this "junk" was for his sake, because he thought Roy was handsome when maybe Roy didn't.

The young man dismissed that thought immediately. The man had an ego the size of an entire continent.

And if Ed could have this kind of effect on the other alchemist, then wouldn't he have just let him in, just a little, on what the big secret was? Would he have possibly cheated on him? Would he have let Ed go one thinking that he had?

0o0o0o0

When Roy stepped off the train to face a very angry Riza, he suddenly wished it was police officers greeting him instead. Standing next to her was an equally displeased doctor who was already showing signs of her fifth month of pregnancy. Roy felt Liam's hand tighten on his own, and he returned the glare he was receiving from both women.

"Ladies," he said. "This is Liam. Liam, you probably remember your Aunt Riza."

Liam nodded and like a polite gentleman, extended his hand to Riza for her to shake. The blonde's face visibly softened at that, and she crouched down until she was at his level before shaking his hand.

"Liam," Roy said, then directing his son to the doctor. "This is Melissa Rosenberg. She is a doctor, and she's going to give you a quick check-up."

Liam nodded and extended a hand to the doctor, which she took and shook. "You'll have to excuse me if I don't kneel down." She rubbed over the bump at her stomach. "It's getting harder to get back up once I do."

The alchemist saw his son looking wide-eyed at the woman's belly, but said nothing. He wondered if after meeting the doctor, Liam was going to need a little talk about the birds and the bees. "Now," the doctor said with a smile—Mel could be disarming with one; Roy knew, having dated her for nearly a month a few years ago—"let's go have you checked out."

Brown eyes were seeking answers from Roy, and he looked down at them with a smile. "She'll take good care of you, and I'll be there the whole time. Promise."

Liam nodded. "Um… are you having a baby?" he asked of the doctor. "There was a friend of mine. His mom was going to have a baby and looked like you. Then there was another friend of mine who wasn't having a baby and looked like you too…" He frowned. "Mom said I shouldn't have asked her about it."

"I am having a baby," Melissa said with a little chuckle. "You're a talker like your dad, aren't you?"

"Well, I guess so," Liam said. "Dad? What about Ed?"

The two women both looked at Roy in surprise, and it made the man hastily explain, "His cat. It's named Ed. I have to go claim him."

Riza nodded and offered Liam her hand. "Will you come with me, and your dad can meet us in the second office to the right inside?"

"I'll be just a minute, and then I'll have Ed with me," Roy said to his son.

"O-okay," the boy said, releasing Roy's hand and taking Riza's. Roy ruffled his son's hair and reminded him, "I'll be back. Promise."

Liam nodded and Roy went to retrieve the cat.

There were forms to sign and a few levels of people to go through before he had the cage with the ruffled-looking cat inside. He peered down at the gold-green eyes, which narrowed at him. "Yeah, I know, you wanted to be with Liam. But you better start behaving yourself because you're stuck with me now."

The cat growled at him and Roy rolled his eyes. "Just like your namesake."

0o0o0o0

Ed had stalled as long as Havoc and Al would let him. He knew he couldn't really justify staying another moment, but it was hard to leave the place that he considered his home, even if it had been Roy's first.

Of course, that hadn't stopped him from completely disorganizing the man's clothes, looking as though he'd been a little more haphazard than was necessary to retrieve his own clothing, even though he'd done it long after he'd had everything packed away. In reality, he had just let them fly about the already feather-covered room.

The bathroom, so maybe he'd "accidentally" tipped over a bottle of expensive cologne into the sink and a bottle of shampoo into the bottom of the shower.

Ed wasn't proud of his behavior at the moment, but as he didn't have Roy there to just punch like he wanted to, he had to settle for doing a little petty vandalism to their home, no, Roy's home. It wasn't Ed's anymore and since the man just couldn't open up, no matter what Ed did. Maybe the place never really was Ed's to begin with.

He heard the door open as he was heading back downstairs.

"Yeah, yeah, Al, I know, 'Quit stalling.'"

He came down from the stairs and turned at the bottom banister to find Roy standing at the door, a little boy at his side. Ed froze, grateful he hadn't dropped his box as he saw the two. The boy… there was no denying the resemblance. Save for slightly lighter eyes and some freckles, the boy was Roy's spitting image. The boy had stopped midway as he was opening a cage with what looked like a very rumpled and perturbed cat and was staring at him.

"Roy," Ed said, not really certain what else to say. The kid was about the same age as Elysia Hughes, maybe a year or so younger. Definitely not like Roy had cheated on him in the last year, at least to create the kid.

But Roy had a family, or at the very least, a son, maybe brother, who he'd never told Ed about. Was this kid the big secret, the thing he couldn't tell Ed about?

Okay, so Ed knew he wasn't great with all kids, but there were some he could really get attached to. So did the man think this would change things somehow? But the boy was about six or seven years old. He'd been friends with Roy for at least three or four of those years, so why hadn't the man trusted him just to tell him?

"Ed," Roy responded, looking as though he'd expected and even hoped that the blond would be long gone by the time he got home.

"Like my cat?" the boy asked as he pulled the orange ball of fluff from the cage and looked at Ed, who was currently raising an eyebrow in curiosity why the boy had a cat sharing his name. "Mr. Ed, sir," the boy asked. "Why do you have feathers in your hair?"

Ed turned a little pink, but whether in embarrassment that he still had the down feathers through his braid or in anger at the man he was facing now, he wasn't sure.

"Dad," the boy asked, looking up innocently at Roy, "did you name my cat after him?"

There was only a small nod, and for some reason that made Ed feel even more like punching Roy.


	8. Eds

**Chapter 8  
**

**Eds**

Ed looked from Roy to the boy. He managed a smile for the boy who looked so much like his former lover. While the boy was looking up at him innocently from his brown eyes, Roy looked almost daring, as though he expected Ed to make a scene. The younger man's eyes narrowed as he looked up at his former lover—he tried to ignore the stinging in his chest at mentally referring to Roy as that. He looked back at the boy and forced his expression to soften as he stepped nearer the kid.

"Hey," he said as he crouched down to bring himself to the boy's level. "I'm Edward Elric."

The boy smiled and held out his hand. "I'm Liam Tyler."

Ed took the boy's hand and shook it. He managed a smile on his face, even as he wanted to smack the boy's father. Over and over, he repeated in his head that it wasn't the boy's fault. He just had a bastard for a dad—and strangely enough, Ed didn't have a problem thinking of Roy as one.

"Nice to meet you." Ed stood back up and looked Roy in the eyes—regardless of the height difference between his own and the older man's. "I need to talk to you."

To his surprise, the cat that had been in the boy's arms was now sniffing Ed's legs and then rubbing against them.

"Ed likes you, Ed," Liam said and then laughed quietly. "Sorry. But, it's funny you're both Eds."

"Well, your Ed probably remembers this Ed," Roy said. Ed tried to ignore that he had gone from "my Ed" to "this Ed," but it stung all the same. "After all, it was his brother Al who saved your cat, and Ed made his bed."

He gestured to an open box on the floor and it was all the young man could do not to gape at it. This was the cat from all those years ago? Roy had somehow saved it?

That didn't change how angry Ed still was at the man, but it was a bit of information to log away, and to tell Al. His brother had felt guilty for not finding the cat a home for ages.

"This isn't really the time, Ed," Roy said, going immediately into condescending Colonel mode. Ed hadn't seen that side of Roy in a while, and it only reminded him why it used to piss him off so much.

"Well, since I'm packing up my stuff, there isn't going to really be another time."

"Don't worry about it, Chief," Havoc said as he walked up and grinned so casually that Ed envied his ability to do it despite the tension in the air. Even the innocent and oblivious boy had stopped smiling. "I'll watch over Liam for a bit. Help him get some things unpacked. You talk to the boss." He looked down at Liam. "Don't know if you remember me. You were still pretty little, but I talk to you on the phone when you call your dad once in a while. I'm Jean Havoc."

The boy smiled and nodded. "I remember."

"Jean," Roy said. "What are you doing here?"

"The boss is moving in with me," Havoc said, smile still on his face. "Thought I could at least help him pack up."

"If Al comes up, tell him to get reacquainted with the cat. Apparently the bas—Roy took him in after all."

Roy looked between them both, looking confused, apparently, at the mention of Al more than anything. "Come on." He grabbed Roy's arm with his automail, squeezing it a bit too tight for the other man's comfort, not tight enough for his own satisfaction.

0o0o0o0

Roy winced at the feeling of the automail on his arm. Ed had been far more composed than he'd expected he would, but the once rebellious teen had become a man while Roy had watched the change happening in him. It really shouldn't have been so surprising that Ed had become an adult finally. An adult who was looking at him with a fury and hurt in his eyes that Roy hadn't really counted on.

Ed pulled him into the study, and Roy couldn't help but notice how many things were gone now. It struck him at that moment how much he'd incorporated his lover into his life, every aspect of it.

Roy was pulled out of his thoughts by the latch shutting on the study door. He turned abruptly and looked over at Ed.

"You son of a bitch," Ed hissed, his voice low and cold. It almost sent shudders through the older man's spine. The words were not unexpected, but the way it was said was.

"Ed," Roy said, defensively, "I do not have time for this."

"Too damned bad," Ed said, poking him in the chest with the index finger of his automail. It hurt, but Roy tried not to show it. "You had a kid? And you kept that from me?"

"I couldn't very well tell you when you were just a kid yourself," Roy said. "Riza was the only one who knew about Liam until he was three. By then you were fifteen and still bucking my authority so much—"

"Damn it, Roy, I didn't say I wanted to know from the very beginning. But I thought I'd earned your trust when we fought against the rebels near the Ishballan territories. And if not then, then what about when we started seeing one another or when I moved in?" Ed shook his head. "I thought… I thought you trusted me more than that."

This wasn't how this was supposed to go. Ed was supposed to be mad, go away so that Roy didn't have to face him like this, not that he really thought he would. Ed looked far more hurt than Roy had expected.

"I didn't think you could understand," Roy said.

"At some point you got a woman pregnant, there was a baby, and it is now Liam." Ed looked at him. "What couldn't I understand about that? I don't give a damn about it. I'm more pissed about the fact that you couldn't tell me. You didn't trust me with something as important as this."

Again, a far more mature response than Roy had expected, and he simply couldn't meet the young man's eyes any longer. He had known Ed all these years, been sleeping beside him for nearly one of them, and he was only now realizing just how adult his lover was.

"At least I know who the bed is for," Ed said. "I thought you expected me to take it while you took our… the old one."

"I expected you to be gone by the time I got back," Roy admitted.

Ed huffed and went for the door to the study. "Well, you came five minutes too early." He turned the handle. "Goodbye Roy."

0o0o0o0

Ed had managed the faintest smile to Liam because he knew it wasn't the boy's fault. No matter how easy it would have been to simply blame the seven-year-old for the crimes of his father, it just wasn't fair. It wasn't right.

Al had taken the last of Ed's boxes to the car and Havoc surprised Ed the most by putting a comforting arm around him. When they got to the man's car—a beat-up old clunker, but drivable—he even gave Ed the tiniest squeeze to his shoulders. It was reassuring, when a lot of things weren't, that he had Havoc as a friend. Really, he had quite a few at the office, guessing by the number of offers of places to stay he'd received and the offers to cook for him.

He got into the older man's car and sat in the passenger seat. He barely noticed as Al climbed inside behind him. He knew Al said something to him, something about feeling sorry for him, but Ed didn't really hear it, only nodded when he heard the words followed by the feeling of his brother's flesh and blood hand patting his shoulder.

0o0o0o0

Roy put on a cheerful smile for his son as he went to show the boy his new bedroom. "And if you'd like, we can go out tonight and get you paint, wallpaper, new toys, anything you want."

"Okay," Liam said, looking so happy, it nearly killed Roy that he hadn't done this before. He could have, the last year or so, had Liam around more often. Maybe if he had, his son wouldn't have suffered so much. He and Ed probably could have gotten along, if Ed would have forgiven Roy not telling him about Liam when they were starting their friendship. Above all else, though, he could have spared Liam the pain and fear he saw in the boy's eyes when he thought no one was looking.

"Dad?" Liam asked, putting a hand on Roy's arm. "Are you okay?"

Roy blinked a bit too much as his eyes stung. He managed a smile. "I'm fine, Liam. Let's get you settled into your brand new room."

Liam looked at him warily, brown eyes far too knowing for a boy of his age. A little orange puff of fur was already making its rounds through the house, trying to lay claim to its new home. Speaking of claim, Roy realized belatedly that the cat would need a litter box. "Would you like to see a little alchemy?" he asked his son.

The boy's eyes had a wary air to them that made the state alchemist very angry at his one-time lover. Rather than voice or show his concern, Roy again put on a smile and put his arm around his son. "Ed is going to need a litter box."

Roy led Liam out into the back yard, asking him to gather up some materials while he dug some clay and dirt from the yard. Having to do landscaping later was far better than having a male cat urinating all through his home now and for ages after because it would find the scent.

Liam looked far more at ease than he had in a while, and Roy was grateful he could at least offer the distraction. He hated that the boy so eagerly trying to help him now would, in just a few short hours, have to try to explain to a judge exactly what his mother had done to him.

But when he watched his son who normally absorbed anything involving alchemy like a sponge flinch at the act of the transmutation and automatically grab at his back in phantom pain, Roy was reminded of how necessary it was.

He kept a calm expression on his face as he gathered Ed the Cat's new litter box and backyard-clay litter to take into the house. "Think you can convince him to use this?"

"Ed listens to me. He'll use it, but… maybe I should carry it in. I don't think he likes you much yet."

Roy handed the box to his son and opened the back door for him as he very carefully and slowly walked the heavy clay-filled box into the house and sat it on the downstairs bathroom floor.

"Ed!" Liam said. Almost immediately, Roy heard the sound of the cat bounding down the stairs and running to Liam. The orange-furred creature took a wide berth when he saw Roy, but eagerly sniffed out his new litter box. A pair of yellow-green eyes glared at him, insisting that he go the hell out of the room and let it use its litter box in peace. It was somewhat less effective, as the cat had a few feathers sticking out of its fur. Roy wondered why two Eds now had been sporting the look.

Roy exited the room, a little curious as he saw feathers tracing the path that the cat had taken. "I'll be right back and see what Ed got into, okay, Liam? Why don't you try putting some things out in your new room and thinking about what you'd like to do with it?" He smiled and followed the fluffy white trail up to his bedroom, knowing the Ed he was talking about was not likely the Ed that Liam thought.

Behind him, Liam went to the little bedroom that Havoc must have already shown him and disappeared inside as Roy walked to the end of the hall and saw that his bedroom was covered in down feathers. Yet, that wasn't what he noticed. Looking around the room, he couldn't help but see how empty it felt. The bed that he'd once hogged eagerly, never used to sleep with anyone seemed to huge, too big for one person.

He had known Ed would get angry and hurt, and he would probably leave. Roy just hadn't expected there would be such a large part of him that would hope Ed wouldn't go and that he could be there to support Roy now when he needed it most.


	9. Swearing

**Chapter 9  
**

**Swearing**

Havoc parked the car in front of the apartment building, where his place—and Ed's too, now, he reminded himself—was on the fourth floor. Al got out of the car first, immediately grabbing one of the last boxes of Ed's things to haul out.

"Now," Havoc said, "you know Riza lives just two floors down from me. Breda lives across the street in the same building as Falman, and Fuery and Shezka aren't that far downtown." He opened his car door, Ed doing the same.

"I know that." He'd visited them many times and really didn't need this refresher course.

"Well, you'll probably be getting a bunch of visitors in the next few days. They're all going to check on you at some point, you know. But if you want time, let me know. I'll pass the word along."

"Thanks," Ed said. "Time could probably be a good thing."

Entering the main entrance, it seemed time wasn't going to be even hours before he was confronted with his first concerned friends. Standing the lobby at the mailboxes were Riza and Melissa Rosenberg. The doctor had been Ed's when he'd let himself stress to the point of sickness over lying on Al's military files.

"I can make it back to my apartment," Melissa said as she rubbed over her swollen belly.

"Just stay here until we meet with the judge about Liam," Riza told her. "It's closer here."

"Are you just trying to get me up to your place?" Melissa said suggestively, which earned her a small slap from the blonde. "Fine. I'm not turning down someplace that's closer." She lightly tapped the bump. "Makes it hard to walk sometimes."

Riza nodded and smiled affectionately, her eyes drifting over the doctor's shoulder to see Ed. The smile faded.

"Ed," she said. "How are you?"

"I'm fine. Don't let me disturb you," he said with a smile. He liked seeing the two women this playful. There had been seven kinds of drama when they'd started dating because Melissa had already been pregnant thanks to a donor and some connections in the medical community who were experimenting with the new art of artificial insemination. She hadn't told Riza until they'd been on a few dates.

Ed unconsciously sighed. At least the baby hadn't even been the size of an orange before she told Riza. Not like Ed.

"You're not disturbing anything," Melissa said, standing next to Riza. The expression on her face told him that she had heard the tiny puff of air from the young man.

"Do you need any help with anything?" Riza asked Ed.

He turned down her offer and shifted the box in his arms. "I'm fine."

Riza frowned slightly. "I'll be just downstairs," she said, "if you need anything."

"I know. Thank you, though." He began heading up the stairs, trying to ignore the hushed conversation between the two women and two men. He wondered how many times he'd force a smile and swear he was fine. He knew no one believed it, but he'd still try to tell the same lie.

0o0o0o0

Roy was trying to decide what to wear to meet with the judge, not so much in terms of clothing, but rather whether to resume with the patch. Part of him wanted to wear it anyway. Still, he decided that the scars that remained on his cheek and eyelid were probably a better way to garner pity than putting a giant piece of black fabric over his face.

He pulled on his uniform. There was no question that the decorated military blue would guarantee some consideration.

He wondered how Liam was fairing with his own clothing and headed down the hall.

"Liam?" he asked. "Buddy, are you okay?" He heard what sounded like crying from the other side of the door. Slowly, he walked in the room, seeing Liam on the bed, holding Ed the cat. He was definitely crying.

The boy looked up at Roy, fear evident in his expression. "Liam…" Roy said as he approached his son.

"Dad?" Tearful brown eyes met his. "Do I really have to talk to a judge? Tell him… about the tattoos?"

Roy nodded. "I'm sorry, buddy," he said, sitting next to Liam. He even risked, despite a growl from Ed, to put an arm around his son. "We need to make sure your mom can't take you back."

"So I won't be able to see her again?" Liam asked. "I mean… she's my mom… and…"

Roy squeezed his son's shoulders. "I'm so sorry that you have to hurt like this," he said, kissing the head of black hair below him. "But if your mom gets help, I promise you that I won't keep you from her. She needs help, but that doesn't mean you can't ever see her again."

"I'm scared, Dad," Liam said. "What do I say?"

"The truth," Roy said. "They will ask you questions about your mother and about me. I want you to tell the truth, no matter what. Even if you think it might hurt either of our feelings. Okay?"

Liam sniffed as Roy pulled him into a hug. Ed let out a squeak and squirmed out of the boy's arms.

0o0o0o0

Ed began reshuffling his things in the room, trying to find out where to put items that had occupied the better part of a house into one bedroom and a living area. Al helped him where he could and Havoc was in the process of ordering pizza and beer for them all. Ed wasn't entirely sure he wanted his brother to have beer, but he thought it could be worth some entertainment if he did.

And it wasn't as though Ed could stop him. Al was legal to drink, and even if Al wasn't, Ed certainly didn't have the right to tell him not to do it. He'd given up that right years ago along with several others. He had a slight suspicion that his brother would probably look at him disapprovingly when he had a beer or two, or ten. He wondered if Al would know he wasn't a stranger to alcohol. He didn't drink to excess, certainly not the way he'd seen Roy do on occasion, but he was capable of putting away a decent amount for his size.

He didn't think he wanted to get drunk. Ed learned he was a very honest drunk, and he wasn't quite ready to lay himself that bare, not yet.

_"You are a very sexy man, Roy Mustang," Ed said as he let himself be supported by his boyfriend. Still, staggering and slurring as he was, he saw something on the other man's face. "What? Don't believe me?"_

_"You're drunk, Ed," Roy said._

_"These aren't beer goggles," Ed said, then giggled. "I had tequila."_

_"I'm very aware of it. Don't you think it was a bit much?"_

_"Nope," Ed slurred. "Anniversary celebration. Amestris's freedom from the fuhrer bastard!" He grinned dopily up at Roy as he threw his automail arm around the other man. "And I get to go home with a sssspectacular hero. I'm a lucky bastard."_

_"Come on, Ed," Roy said, hauling Ed upstairs._

_"I'm complimenting you here," Ed said. "You should say thank you at least."_

_"Thank you," Roy responded automatically. "But I'm the lucky one."_

_"Pppptttbbbbttt," Ed raspberried. There had been no real reason for it, but he hadn't had the sense to manage a scoff. "I love you, you know."_

_"Now I know you're drunk."_

_"Nope… well, okay, I'm probably drunk." He struggled to walk up the stairs, wondering if there wasn't something wrong with them. They didn't used to be so difficult to climb. "But I swear I love you."_

"Pizza's here,"Havoc called. "Beer, too."

"Are you going to drink?" Al asked Ed.

"Just a little, I think," he said. "You?"

"A glass maybe, I don't care much for beer." Al began putting some of Ed's clothes in the closet as the older brother looked at the younger.

"When did you try?" Ed asked.

"A party at Auntie Pinako's," Al said. "I tried a glass or two. I wasn't too thrilled with it. I like red wine, though, in moderation." He snickered. "You should have seen Winry when we went out to the little restaurant in town. She had a little too much of it and got drunk enough she was saying all kinds of things. It was fun, though I heard about it later for letting her get so far gone."

Ed smiled up at his brother, knowing this was just a small amount of what he'd missed with Al. He hoped that somehow he'd earn the right to find out more about his brother, his new likes and dislikes, what he'd found out with his new body, what hurts and injuries he'd had.

Maybe spending time with Al like he should have done would be the best distraction.

He smiled and went with his brother into the living area that would also serve as a dining room. Havoc began opening the pizza boxes. "I wasn't sure how many to order," Havoc told Ed. "You usually have a big appetite, and I didn't know if Al was as bad as you."

Ed opened his mouth as though to answer, but truthfully, he didn't even know that about his brother.

"I don't think anyone in the world is as bad as brother," Al said with a chuckle

"Hey!" Ed said, bumping his elbow into his little brother, trying to keep his attitude as light as he could manage.

0o0o0o0

Roy took Liam's hand on the short distance to the car, feeling the boy's grip tightening on his own. "I promise, I'll be right there through everything." Liam nodded. Roy opened the passenger door to his car. "I'm not leaving you. I swear."

"You're not supposed to swear," Liam said, quietly. "Mom said. Said it's a really big promise you have to mean to keep. That you mean for bad things to happen to you if you don't."

Roy stopped where he was and pulled the boy into his arms, feeling as though his heart had been ripped out in one swift movement. "Then that is exactly what I mean, Liam." He held his son tight, trying to be careful of the sore spots he knew were on the too-thin back. "Never again."

"But what if those people who want to hurt you come back? Or what if you decide you don't want me around? Jenny Anderson's dad decided he didn't want her around. He doesn't see her at all."

"Not going to happen. I want you here. And those people are gone. And if they're not, your dad can take care of it. Promise."

"You didn't swear to that one," Liam said, making Roy certain his son was far too smart for his age.

_"Put down the gloves, Brigadier General," the man said as he held a gun to Ed's head. Somehow, he had managed to capture the young alchemist and had his hands separated by a board-like contraption, similar to the one he'd heard they used on Zolf Kimblee._

_"Don't you dare, Mustang," Ed said, barely flinching as the man pressed the gun closer to the teen's head._

_"Why do you think I'd give up my gloves for him?" Roy asked, earning a glare from Ed for it._

_"Because he's part of your team, and everyone knows you'd do anything for your team," the man said. "There's a reason you keep them close to you, and it has nothing to do with their ability to move you to the top." He smiled. "You've been a subject of scrutiny for those of us who were loyal to the fuhrer." Roy began removing his first glove from his fingers, then pulling it off all together. As the man watched him, he apparently lost track of Ed and the fact that the teen had pried one hand from the wood restraints._

_Ed clapped his hands together and speared the man in the stomach while Roy snapped his fingers and set off a fireball at the man's shoulder and upper arm that had enough force to guarantee the gun would not hit Ed if he managed to pull the trigger. Thankfully, he didn't._

_It would make another death on Ed's conscience, but the teen still swore he didn't blame Roy for that. He only sent him the doctor's bill for the massively dislocated thumb._

Roy let Liam sit beside him on the bench seat of the vehicle. The smaller body was currently pressing itself up so closely to Roy's that he thought they might be joined if he kept that up. Then his mind reminded him of the symbol on his son's back and how possible that statement could be.

His muscles ached as he fought off the shudder at the thought, not wanting to disturb Liam more than the boy already was. Never, not once, had he thought his son would not be safe with his mother. Karen was determined, as much of a ladder-climber as he was, himself, and that in itself was an important thing. If you were looking for rank, being able to say you had a family was one of the best ways to guarantee it. He remembered how surprised she had been that he'd never claimed Liam.

So why would she do this to him?

And how would he answer questions about why he never took him in? Aside from whatever had gone on recently, all demonstrated evidence showed him to be the parent who came to visit on a whim and her the caregiver, a good mother. Somehow, it made him sick to think he sounded a bit too much like Hohenheim. But he hadn't just left Liam to be raised away from him. He always came for his son, was going to split custody of the boy with Karen if the time came when the attacks would just stop.

_"So, tell me," the woman said in his ear, "how you defeated the fuhrer?" She was a major in the military, and had apparently known what King Bradley had been. She put a knife to his side as he was tied up. Better him than Ed._

_"I burned him," Roy said. It was a half truth._

_"He couldn't die from something as simple as fire. Tell me how you did it? You must know how you make more of him."_

_"I don't know… Aaaa!" He screamed out as the knife dragged across his bare side, where she must have known it would hurt but not kill. Either way, the pain was intense and made __Roy__ question how long he could take it._

_"You're asking the wrong one, lady," Ed said as he stood there with Riza and Havoc. "He knows how to kill. I know how to do it all." Riza immediately opened fire before the woman could manage to stab him with the knife anywhere else, anywhere that the damage would be more permanent. As soon as the major was down, Riza and Havoc were detaining her and stopping the bleeding in her legs. Ed was busy attending to __Roy__._

_"I always said you were a screamer," the young man said, with a too-strained smile, putting his hands over __Roy__'s wounds, as though trying to hold off the blood flow. There were a growing number now. "This is going to hurt. Sorry." He clapped his hands and brought them down on __Roy__'s torn flesh._

It had been six months since that last attempt on his or his friends' lives, and Roy was more prepared now, more suspicious. He did, at least, know that the major, the last of the fuhrer's known supporters was finally behind bars.

The problem was, in doing this, he was not simply bringing his son into his home; he would likely be putting it across national news that he was taking him on and having a custody battle.

He hadn't sworn he'd keep Liam safe, because that wasn't a promise he could guarantee. He could only swear he would do everything in his power and sacrifice his own life for his son's. Roy had simply been in the military long enough that he was more than aware that could sometimes not be enough.


	10. Testimony

**Chapter 10**

**Testimony**

"We are here to decide whether Liam Tyler should be placed into the custody of his father, and whether the treatment of Liam was justifiable reason for Major General Mustang to remove his son from his mother's custody in the manner he did," the judge said, looking so neutral as he spoke that it was driving Roy mad. He couldn't determine if the man had any previous feelings on the case. Even if it wasn't in Roy's favor, at least the man would know where he stood.

Roy could feel the small hand in his own tighten its grip and he looked down at Liam, breaking the eye contact he'd had with the judge. He saw his son biting his bottom lip, and for just a moment, concern for the man at the front of the room vanished. Roy moved his left hand to rub at his son's cheek to calm him as he leaned down close enough to press his lips to the head of black hair.

"You okay, buddy?" he whispered.

"Just afraid I won't be able to tell him when I need to," his son said, a little too loudly. The other attorney glared over at the table where Roy and Liam sat and shushed the boy.

"Mister Tyler," the judge said, making Liam look up, brown eyes wide and frightened, "do you think you could tell it now? So that you don't have to worry about it the whole time we are here?" The elderly man smiled at Liam warmly, and the fear of the judge visibly subsided.

"I… I think so, sir," Liam said.

"I know it is unorthodox, but perhaps it is best to let this boy say his piece now," the judge said. He then looked back at Liam. "Son, why don't you take this chair beside me? That way everyone here can hear you."

Liam nodded as he released Roy's hand so that he could grip the seat of his chair and push himself off. He walked to the front of the courtroom, arms wrapped around himself.

"Sir, this is horribly out of order," the other lawyer said.

"And this is my courtroom," the judge said. "You'll get your chance at an opening statement, but not before this boy gets an opportunity to say what he needs to say. Or would you rather he be too afraid to say anything, in favor or opposed to the major general?"

Liam climbed into the chair on the witness stand and looked up at the judge. "Do I talk now? Or do they have to ask me questions?"

"You can talk," the judge said. "You can talk to me, and the rest of them will hear you just fine." Liam smiled just slightly. "So tell me about your mother."

"Well, she's really smart. A really good alchemist, and she lets me keep my cat Ed, even though she doesn't like him much. She doesn't like my dad much either, especially since he stopped her research funding. She talks about that a lot, and she works down in the basement a lot now since he did." Liam paused and looked down.

"Can you tell me about the basement?"

"Well, there are a lot of strange noises from there, and I'm not supposed to go down unless my mom wants me down there." Liam closed his eyes tightly and still wouldn't look up at the judge. "I don't like going down there."

"Why not?" the judge asked, his voice very calm.

"Mom's been experimenting with new transmutations. Stuff she doesn't let me help her with like she used to. Did you know you can make a tattoo with alchemy, but that it hurts a whole lot?"

"No, I didn't," the judge said. "I don't know much about alchemy. You'll have to dumb it down for me."

Liam looked up and tried to smile, but it looked like he just couldn't manage it. "She did it to Ed first to show me." Liam shivered. "I never heard him cry like that. He was tired for a couple of days after."

The young boy pulled his legs up onto the chair, but the judge didn't correct him for sitting improperly. "She wanted me to know what it would be like."

"And why did you need to know?"

"I… Because…" Liam looked frantically between the judge and his father, and Roy just wanted to go up and pull him from the bench. He wanted to hold him and say that his son had said enough, but Liam surprised him, finding bravery that Roy wasn't sure he, himself, had. The boy dropped his knees and let them fall to the ground, feet smacking the wood base of the witness stand. "Can I show you?"

The judge nodded, but looked surprised when Liam began untucking his shirt.

"It is on his back, Judge," Roy said, clarifying so that the man didn't make Liam stop when he'd managed the courage this far.

Liam lifted his shirt and showed the man his back.

"Judge we can't know that Major General Mustang didn't—"

Roy wanted to cut him off, but it wasn't his voice that rose up in the courtroom. It was Liam's. "My dad would _never_ do this to me! He has never hurt me, ever!"

The boy had dropped his shirt and was glaring at the lawyer, no longer looking afraid. Instead, he was defiant and daring the man to say another bad word about Roy.

"I think what he was trying to say is they may have been drawn on," the judge said.

"You can try to wash them off if you want," Liam said, trying to calm himself. "They don't hurt anymore, but they won't wash away." His voice grew softer. "I tried."

0o0o0o0

Ed was on his fourth beer, realizing he was going to need to stop. Very soon. Alcohol enhanced his current state of mind, and while most pegged him a "happy drunk." He was learning now that he was only happy drunk if he was happy sober.

Of course, he'd never been drunk when sad to discover what he was slowly finding out now: if he was sad sober, he'd be miserable with alcohol. Already twice he'd nearly started to cry, and Ed just didn't cry. Certainly not at the drop of a hat like he was tempted to at the moment.

"…So, I told her the car was mine, and she slapped me with a parking ticket. Here I thought she was drooling over the car and she was trying to find the owner to fine them." Havoc laughed and Ed saw Al snickering, shaking his head. Al was still nursing his first beer, while Havoc was on his fifth.

Ed tried to laugh, but it came out as a nearly strangled sound. Of course, the noise made Al rush to his side in concern and hug him, exactly what Ed didn't need to keep his composure. So he pushed Al away, as he'd been doing for the last few years. "I'm fine, Al," Ed said. "Just give me a minute." He squirmed away from Al's embrace and stood from the table. Havoc was looking up at him, eyes a little glazed from the amount of alcohol he'd had.

"Brother, you can talk to me about it," Al said. "I know I've only been with Winry, but maybe just talking about it can help."

"I don't want to talk about it," Ed said. "Not with you, not with anyone. We broke up. It's over. I don't want to dwell on issues and problems in my relationship with Roy. There's no point. If he didn't trust me enough at any point in our relationship to tell me about his son, then it is over. You don't try to fix something that's junked, and that's what my relationship is, Al. It's in the scrapheap."

Al shook his head. "I don't believe that."

"Of course you don't," Ed scoffed, heading toward the bathroom. "But you aren't exactly the most realistic person in the world."

He ignored the look of hurt on Al's face. That struck a little too close to home for both of them, and rather than say more that would only injure his brother, Ed left the table and headed to his bedroom.

0o0o0o0

"I'd like to call Roy Mustang to the stand." The major general stood, giving his son's hand a little squeeze as he left him for the same chair Liam had occupied at the beginning of the hearing. The older man glanced back over his shoulder at his son, offering him a reassuring smile which he saw the seven-year-old return. Roy turned back to the stand and allowed himself to be sworn in before taking the seat.

The other attorney, the one Roy wasn't paying an arm and a leg for, began questioning him about his absenteeism as a father, a term that irritated the man more than he could say. He hadn't been present every waking hour, and that troubled him still, but it had been a safety issue. Up until this point, he'd genuinely believed Karen was the better option to the crazy people who wanted Roy hurt and/or dead.

"I was wrong."

He explained the markings on Liam's back as a transmutation symbol that he was familiar with, one involved in controversial experimentation that was part of the military's past. He couldn't elaborate further because Shou Tucker and his chimeras remained one of the great military secrets, one of the things a person just didn't talk about in the military. One that the military wouldn't let the public know about, but yet had no laws to enforce. To create laws would mean explaining how the military knew they were dangerous and wrong and the millions of other things that the chimeras were.

"I told you that is confidential military information, but I am aware of the implications of the symbol," Roy said, keeping his voice calm as he was questioned for the third time. "But does it truly matter what she alchemically _tattooed_ onto my son's back? Or does it matter that she did it in the first place?"

He then went on to tell of how Liam's school had contacted him, concerned for the boy's health, or hoping that he had care of the boy and that was the reason for two weeks' worth of absences.

His lawyer would enter written testimony from both the headmistress of Liam's school and Liam's teacher, which Roy knew could only help his case. If they thought him in any way unfit, they would not have called him the moment they suspected something was wrong.

For the moment, however, Roy was on his own. In more ways than one.

"Yes, sir," Roy said, "but that relationship ended recently. Why it seems to make a difference that it was with another man, I don't understand. I was involved with Edward Elric the Fullmetal Alchemist and yes, he did live with me. That has all changed."

"And if he comes back?"

It will prove Ed is the dumbest person on the planet and Roy the luckiest. "Then he comes back."

"Statistically speaking, homosexual relationships between two men can be very brief and you—"

"Statistically speaking," Roy interrupted in a similar tone, "almost a third of heterosexual marriages in Amestris end in divorce. And, I am bisexual, not homosexual, but as my recent relationship with Ed has been the only relationship I've had in ten years, will you pardon if I ask you don't try to sum me up with statistics based upon one year-long relationship?"

"How do we know you won't have a series of women or men coming and going from your home?"

"Because I haven't for the last four years? If you can make statistics of one relationship, I'd think four years of patterned behavior would be more than enough."

Then they began again on the attacks. This was what Roy feared the most, that the very reason he'd let Liam stay with Karen would be what kept him from Roy. He had taken extra safety measures the moment Ed entered his house. All people needed was a new way to hurt Roy, and he knew he had to keep Ed safe to prevent it. There was a special security system at his house with additional patrols from the military and Central's police force.

He had walls around his home that didn't used to be there. He had already lined up a nanny and a school for Liam, both of which he'd done extensive checks on—or rather, his team had at his pleading requests.

"No I cannot guarantee his safety with me, but I can guarantee the lack of it if Liam stays with his mother."

When his overpriced, yet somehow worth every cent, lawyer began asking Roy questions, he got to show his softer side. Though the major general found that side the most difficult to put on display. As though it was being dragged out of him, Roy told of how he felt for his son and the rest of his team. He reluctantly admitted how protective he was of them all.

He saw his son grin when he managed to get question after question right about Liam's interests and favorite things. If this hearing did nothing, it reinforced to his boy that yes, his father did know an awful lot about him and had listened to him over the years.

0o0o0o0

Ed stepped out of the bedroom later, a somewhat sheepish expression on his face as he saw Al waiting in the living area. "I'm sorry," he said. "It's the alcohol."

"It's my fault," Havoc said as he was bagging up some garbage. "I knew that. I've seen you with a few in you."

Ed nodded, folding his arms across his chest. "It's just been a rough few days, and I'm not exactly going on a lot of sleep."

Al gave him a sympathetic smile, which irritated him, or rather increased his own irritation with himself. "So…" Ed said with a sigh. "I need to deal with this all a little better I think." That included Al, but he didn't want to delve into that just yet. "Havoc, what can you tell me about Mustang and his kid?"

"Some of that's for him to tell," Havoc said. "But I'll tell you what I can. And Ed, the only people who knew about Liam were Major Hughes and Captain Hawkeye. Then I found out by accident when Liam got sick and I was the only available person to pick up his cold medicine. The rest of the team found out gradually after Liam figured out how to call his dad's number at work and didn't know he should pretend not to be the Major General's son."

"So why didn't he tell me?"

Havoc shrugged. "I don't know." He sat down in a battered recliner. "He doesn't like to talk about himself, but I can tell you after a certain point, he got afraid to tell you. You could see it. At least, according to Falman and Hawkeye you could. I never did."

Ed only frowned at that, arms still crossed at his front. Why hadn't the man trusted him? Why had he feared him? Roy Mustang was a smug bastard who went toe-to-toe with Ed when the rest of the world feared him. Afraid?

0o0o0o0

Roy was once again holding Liam's hand as the judge began to speak his decision.

"I think that there needs to be additional investigation into this matter, but it is my opinion, Major General that your actions seem justified in getting your son from his mother's custody. At this point, I see no reason why he cannot remain in your care."

"That means I stay with you, right?" Liam asked.

Roy managed only a few bobs of his head before the boy launched himself at him.

Well, he'd won the first battle, but being a father, confronting Karen, helping Liam recover… All of that was still ahead of him and it terrified him.


	11. The Office

Ed stared up at the front doors of Central Headquarters. Nearly a week since he'd last seen Roy, he had to turn in his report to the older man. The problem was, he didn't want to. Didn't want to see him, didn't want Roy to be his commanding officer, didn't want to be here today.

Of course, for Ed, there was no backing out of the military. Roy had told him as much, as did countless others that for the state alchemists, particularly the brilliant ones, there was no real escaping the military. As Ed was a prodigy, a known one, there wasn't any chance that he would be faking sudden ineptitude any time soon, and any effort to leave on his part would have taken years, most likely.

With a frown, he closed his eyes and shook his head. He had faced down homunculi, crazy alchemists, gun-wielding nut-jobs. He could handle Roy Mustang, if for no other reason than because he had to.

To his surprise, he found a familiar face grinning at him from the doorway. Havoc was holding the door open for him. "How long, exactly, are you planning on standing out here?"

Ed looked up at Havoc and rolled his eyes. "I was getting up the courage to come in. How'd you know I was up here at all?"

Havoc pointed up to a large window, where Ed swore he saw a flash of blue and black disappearing from it. "Damn. Forgot the bastard's window was there."

Havoc walked down to the steps and put an arm around Ed. "You've been staying out of your office all week and are due a report to the major general."

Ed frowned and let himself be led into the building by the older blond. "I don't want to see him," he said, feeling like a petulant child. "But I don't have any choice."

"No, you don't. Riza and I have already checked that."

Ed huffed and nodded. Heading up to the stairs and through the front door, he walked with Havoc, who still had his arm around him as though afraid Ed might bolt and run.

To say that it was embarrassing to walk through headquarters guided by Havoc like he was a little kid, and he certainly felt like one at the moment, was an understatement.

Riza's understanding and yet penetrating glare did not help matters either.

"Okay, enough. I'm in here. I'm not going to back out," Ed said. He wriggled free of Havoc's grasp and headed for Roy's office, well ahead of Havoc or anyone else. He was surprised to see a small figure sitting at Riza's desk, looking up at him with a smile, but not daring to say anything. He was very different from his father.

"Hey, Liam," Ed said, going over to the desk. He saw Havoc giving him a look that obviously said he suspected Ed was stalling, and maybe he was, but he wasn't going to ignore the kid. After all, it wasn't Liam's fault that his father kept him a secret. No more than it was his fault that Roy hadn't really been a big part of his life either.

"Hi, Ed," Liam said, looking serious.

"I'm surprised to see you here, kid," Ed said.

"It was a half-day of school and Mrs. Hughes couldn't watch me today. Elysia had a dentist's appointment," Liam said. "So dad's letting me come to the office. Just wish there was more to do."

"Well, luckily it's only for one day," Ed said, noticing that while Liam talked freely, his attitude still seemed somber. "You okay?"

"Well, Dad said you were the one who found Ed," the dark-haired boy said. Aside from the freckles and brown eyes, he was Roy's spitting image, and that hurt a bit, but Ed did his very best not to let it show.

"My brother did, actually," Ed said. "Your dad and I competed so that he would keep him. Your dad got him, so he's all yours."

"But, there was one girl in school talking about how her parents lost their dog because they didn't take good care of it, the place they got it took him back."

"Ed the cat looked fine to me," Ed the alchemist said. "Besides, I gave him to your dad, and your dad gave him to you, so if anyone takes him, it would be your dad, and you're kind of living with him, aren't you?"

Liam nodded and seemed to grasp Ed's circular logic.

"You see, even if your dad took him back, he'd still be at the house with you," Ed said with a smile. "Besides, I think the other Ed likes you a lot."

The boy seemed a little more confident at that, and looked back down at his drawings, one that was definitely the orange furball that Ed could only hope was covering all of Roy's uniforms in hair. "Are you going to visit my dad?"

Ed schooled a smile on his face. "Yes, I am. I guess I should be heading in there soon."

"You don't want to?" the boy asked, his entire expression open and searching. With a desire to wince at it, Ed remembered that look. He remembered it more from Al's face, and he supposed there were times he'd worn it as well. It was the expression of a child who didn't know his father, not really, and was seeking every last tidbit of information to fill in the gaps.

"Lots of paperwork," Ed said with a smile. "About like homework. I have to take it in to your dad to check over it all."

The boy nodded. He obviously got Ed's message, and the young man was grateful. He didn't want the kid terrified of his own father because Ed just didn't want to face him.

"Guess I should go in now," Ed said. "No point in delaying it."

"Well, I hope you get a good grade," Liam said. "Or whatever it is you get in the military."

Ed grinned. "Thanks kid."

0o0o0o0

When the doorknob turned and Ed came through, quickly shutting the door, Roy couldn't help but feel his insides clench. Last week when he'd been trying to settle everything with Liam, he'd been able to push all of those feelings aside. Now, seeing Ed here, seeing Ed look like he wanted to be anywhere but, it just about killed the older man.

"You've got a good kid," Ed said, walking to the desk and slapping a handful of folders down on it. "Shame I didn't get to know him like the rest of the team."

"This isn't about personal issues, Fullmetal," Roy ground out. If it was, the green monster currently driving the major general nuts would have been questioning Ed what the little display was outside with Havoc. He knew he didn't deserve to ask such questions, but really, he had to wonder if Ed had managed to replace him that fast.

Ed shrugged, and it killed Roy to see him look this defeated. "Whatever." The blond put his hands in the pockets of the uniform he was forced to wear as any other member of the military. "Just so you know, I looked to see if I could get a transfer. I can't, but I had Hawkeye look into it for me."

"I could have told you that you couldn't."

"Yeah, well, I probably wouldn't have believed it coming from you, would I?" Ed asked. His golden eyes held Roy's dark ones at a level gaze. "But yeah, since you're over all state alchemists, and they're not likely to put me as an enlisted man, I'm stuck. Apparently, the military doesn't give a damn if you break up with your superior officer because they don't really condone you dating him."

Ed didn't move to the sofa, which he would have done just a few weeks ago. He'd have made himself comfortable while Roy read over his reports on research progress, making witty comebacks to Roy's commentary on the reports or Ed's chickenscratch handwriting. Instead, he stood at the edge of Roy's desk, painfully close and waited like the good and obedient soldier Roy knew Ed wasn't.

"So why tell me this?"

"Because I wanted you to know that I did, so that some higher-up general didn't rub it in your face," Ed said. "Because I didn't want you getting angry at Hawkeye for helping me."

Really, Roy couldn't have been angry at her, not entirely because he knew she'd help to do whatever she could for the young man. After all, Roy had instilled that in all of his team from the moment Ed became officially a state alchemist, even a bit before then. Well, most of Roy's mind was remembering this. The rest of him was to busy feeling betrayed by his team.

Rather than acknowledge any of that, Roy focused instead on the documents Ed had presented him with. In all truthfulness, Ed's work heading up research for the military was always done well, though the older man had teased him often, back when he had the right to do so.

"Everything looks in order," Roy said.

Ed raised an eyebrow. It was a near-perfect imitation of Roy's own expression and looked strange on the blond. Of course Roy knew he'd picked up a few habits and expressions of Ed's as well. Thanks to a few arguments with Ed—the kind that they sometimes picked just for the make up and/or angry sex—he found that sometimes when he would argue with someone else, he would gesture with his hands in a way he never did before his relationship with the younger man.

"No comments about my handwriting? No comments on the fact that I approved duplicate water purification projects?"

Roy shook his head. For important things, he knew Ed liked to approve as many requests as he got. That tended to ensure that one if not two different research plans like the water projects would get completed in record time.

"Nothing at all then?"

Roy wanted to tell him the thousands of things that he wanted to say, the apologies that didn't really matter, the confession that he did love Ed, anything to fix this, but nothing came out. Instead, he set the folders down on the desk and pushed them toward the blond. He couldn't imagine how it looked to Ed, but he knew that he just couldn't bear even the briefest brush of their hands like this.

"Okay," Ed said. "Well then. I'll be in my office."

As the young man said it, he scooped the remaining folders off Roy's desk. Very quickly, he was turned and walking out.

0o0o0o0

Ed managed a smile at Liam as he left.

"Was it bad?" Liam asked and Ed shook his head, not trusting his voice at the moment. Roy hadn't even wanted to give him his folders. He'd all but shoved them at him. He'd had nothing to say, nothing good, not even the usual nitpicks. Roy didn't want to be around him any more than Ed had, or at least thought he had.

Ed waved a goodbye to the kid and headed to his office. He was nearly there when he felt a hand on his shoulder.

"You okay?" Havoc asked. Ed only shrugged. The hand became an arm that wrapped around his smaller shoulders and Ed did his best not to break down, not because he feared crying, which would just be embarrassing. Ed didn't cry often, and instead, he tended to lash out. It was that reaction that he feared more so than bawling. He knew he was more likely to hit something, probably a wall, and with his automail hand. It would make him look like a lunatic.

The last thing he needed was for someone to say he was unstable. His break up with Roy was already office gossip. He certainly didn't need people to have an outburst to add to the existing talk about them both.

"Havoc," Ed said, "do you think you could ask Roy if he'd mind Al watching the kid for a while. Liam looks bored to death."

"You really want to do that?" Havoc asked. "I mean, that's kind of surprising… considering."

Ed shrugged. "Al's been looking for something to do, and the kid can't help it that his dad is who he is."

"I'm going to give Al a phone call," Ed said.

Havoc turned and walked away. Ed couldn't begin to admit how much he appreciated how understanding the older man had been, how they had all been, really. At some point or another, one of the team had come to visit him, to see how he was doing and entertain him for the night. He appreciated the thought, even if Shezka and Fuery's visit had been a bit sickening. New relationships being what they were, the two of them could be a bit lovey-dovey.

Havoc just seemed to be the constant presence

Ed walked into his office, frowning when he saw the small stack of papers on top of it. He'd seen worse on Roy's desk, but he knew this would take time.

First things first, Ed walked to his desk and picked up the phone, dialing Havoc's—and now his as well—apartment. It rang a few times, and Ed figured his brother was probably debating on whether he should pick up the phone. He was grateful that Al decided to answer it.

"Hello?" Al asked.

"Al? Are you still looking for something to do today?"

"I wouldn't mind. Did you need help at the office? Did everything go okay with… you know?"

"It went okay," Ed said. "But the kid's here and looks bored to death. I didn't know if you'd be willing to entertain him for a day. He's got an old friend of yours you might be interested in seeing. Remember the cat that was part of my competition with Mustang?"

There was a long pause. "You're doing a favor for the major general?"

"I'm doing a favor for the kid," he said. "I get the feeling something is up with him. I get a sort of unsettling feeling about him. He looks sad."

"Well, it seems like there were some things that went wrong with his mom, so that would be understandable."

"Yeah, but he shouldn't be left alone."

"I'll be over. The major general is okay with this?"

"Havoc's asking him now if he would be. I just wanted to make sure that you were okay with it too."

"Yeah," Al said. "I wouldn't mind. It'd just be for a few hours right? Do you think you'll be able to come along or something?"

"I don't think so," Ed told him. "The state alchemist exam is coming up soon, and I'm rewriting a portion of the main part of the exam. Not to mention, I have about twenty or so different applications for new research."

"Right. The exam." Ed heard the hurt in Al's voice, but he didn't and wouldn't acknowledge it. Not now. He owed Al an explanation, but it was just so easy to delay it.

"I appreciate it, Al."

"You know, I know you don't like to show it as much, the way you always picked on me for being too soft on people, but I don't think you and I are so different, Brother."

If only he knew, Ed thought.

"I'll see you when you get here, okay Al?"

"Okay, Brother."

0o0o0o0

Roy had gone out to check on Liam shortly after Ed left. He'd no sooner stepped out of his door than he saw Ed and Havoc walking down the hall. Again, havoc had his arm around the smaller-framed man. It could have been a simple act of friendship. Of all of his team, Havoc was the most likely to seek out some physical contact from his friends. However, Roy felt there was more to it. He knew logically it could have been his mind sabotaging himself and that there was nothing to it. There were any number of reasons why he would actually want to believe what it would seem he shouldn't want to. Perhaps because it was easier to think the hadn't hurt Ed so badly that he couldn't find someone again, or that Roy deserved to see that he was right all along, that really, he hadn't been all that special to the younger man, easily replaced. Either way, his mind was filling in the blanks and decided that the first lieutenant and the lieutenant colonel might have a blossoming romance.

"Dad?" Liam asked, pulling Roy from his thoughts. It made him feel a bit sheepish that he'd allowed his thoughts on Ed to distract him from his son. Liam was far more important than his own failed romance.

"Hmm?" the older man asked, turning his attention to his son, his expression softening.

"Did Ed get you mad?" Liam asked.

"No. Not at all," Roy said, resting his hand on Liam's shoulder, taking note of the faintest flinch when he did. "Why would you say that??"

"You were glaring," Liam told him.

"I didn't realize," Roy said. He looked down at the drawing on his son's desk. It was of both Eds. "This is very good."

"I thought Ed might like it," Liam said with a shrug.

"I'm sure he will. I think he was really surprised to see how well you were taking care of Ed the cat," Roy said. "He didn't even know someone had taken it in." Liam smiled, but the smile looked so sad that Roy couldn't help but take his boy into his arms. He held his son for a few minutes, just letting the boy's cheek rest against his shoulder. "You really did take good care of Ed. If you didn't he wouldn't love you so much."

Liam sniffled and nodded. "Mom didn't like Ed much."

"Well, I like Ed, even if he doesn't like me much," Roy said.

"Dad? If I have to go back to mom's, will you take care of Ed?" Liam asked, pulling back from their hug to look Roy in the eyes. "Please?"

"Liam, I'm going to do everything in my power to make sure you never have to go back there again. Either of you."

"But if I—"

"No, Liam. As far as I'm concerned, this is your home now. With me. Okay, buddy?"

Liam gave a faint nod as a throat could be heard clearing. Roy looked up to see Havoc standing, looking as though he'd been there a moment or two.

"Sir, the lieutenant colonel wondered if you would want Al to drop by and maybe watch over Liam for a bit. Maybe Liam could introduce Al to Ed, since Al was the one who rescued him in the first place." Roy had to admit that the offer surprised him just a bit, and it took a moment for his mind to understand that Ed held no grudges against Liam, at the very least.

Seeing the questioning look from the little boy, Roy explained, "Al is Ed's younger brother. He rescued your cat and Ed made him his bed when he knew they couldn't keep it. Ed also made the bet with me so that I could give him to you."

"Is he nice?" Liam asked.

"Very," Roy said. "Would you like to have him take you out for a bit? Get you out of the office?"

"I… I like being here with you, but…"

"It's kind of boring right?" Roy asked with a smile, receiving a nod in return. "Then you go ahead with Al. I think you'll have a good time with him. He's an alchemist too, and he loves animals."

Liam smiled and Roy looked up at Havoc. "Tell Ed thank you for offering his brother's services."

Havoc nodded. "Well, you know the boss. Tries to fix whatever he thinks is worth fixing, even a kid who is stuck at a desk all day." He smiled at Liam, but not before giving Roy a very serious look.

Roy decided that it was now or never that he either confirmed or refuted his own thoughts on the relationship between Havoc and Ed. Watching as Havoc started to turn, heading back to Ed's office, he said. "Lieutenant," he said, watching as Havoc turned his head to look back at him, "be good to him."

There was a moment of confusion on Havoc's face, even mild surprise, and Roy just waited, hoped, for the man to deny what Roy suspected. Maybe even get angry. Instead, he just shook his head as though highly disappointed in the older man.

"Don't worry. I will."

Roy ignored the feeling of the floor opening up beneath him and just stared after Havoc. Liam in the meantime began gathering up his coloring.


	12. Bad Boyfriend

_I'm a very bad author. I didn't post this chapter as soon as it was done, and I've already got another for you. So I'll post this one now, and then another within a day or so. Maybe sooner if you really, really want it._

Roy managed by some small miracle to get home at a reasonable hour, in time to see Al playing a game of checkers with Liam. Roy couldn't express how grateful he was that the young man had been willing to help out.

"Daddy!" Liam said, hopping down from his chair and running to the hall where Roy was waiting for him with arms open. Moments like this, when Liam looked so young and so… happy, Roy regretted their time apart almost as much as when he saw the pain or sadness on his son's face. Taking his son into his arms, Roy gave him a big hug, maybe one a bit tight for a seven-year-old's body, but not enough to hurt him. Like a punch to his stomach, the knowledge once again hit him that he could have had this every day, or at least on off-times with Karen.

He could feel his son's arms trying to return the hug as tightly as Roy had given it. "Did you have a fun time with Al?" Roy asked.

"Yeah," Liam said. "We played games and played with Ed."

"That's great," Roy said, noticing that Al had left the room as well. The look he got from the youngest Elric was glacial, and while Roy might admit he deserved it, he was surprised to find it coming from Al. "Thank you for watching over him for me." Roy got a nod from Al in return, but the young man still looked like he was barely containing his anger.

"I was glad my brother decided to be the bigger man and offer my services," Al said. "Liam is a great kid." He patted the boy on his back and moved into his line of sight. "Maybe while I'm in Central, I'll be seeing you around?"

"I hope so," Liam said with a grin. "I really did have a lot of fun today. Elysia's nice, but she always tries to get me to play dress ups, and all she's got are dresses."

Al chuckled. "My girlfriend Winry tried that with my brother and me when we were kids. I managed to get out of it, but Winry's grandmother still has a picture of my brother in a pink tutu."

Roy couldn't help it, but he snickered, and before he even thought about it, he said, "I would pay good money to see that."

"I wouldn't count on it," Al said. He headed for the door. "Liam, I had a really nice time today. Hopefully I'll get to see you a bit more while I'm here in town."

"How long are you in town for?" Roy asked, standing from his crouched position and looking fully at Al.

"As long as I'm needed," Al said, turning the knob of the door. "Bye, Liam." He managed a genuine smile for the boy. Like his brother, Al seemed able to separate his feelings toward Roy and his son.

"Bye, Al!" Liam said with a wave.

Al headed out the door and the boy went into the livingroom. Though Roy was tempted to follow him to tell him the idea he had for the evening—courtesy of Gracia—he quickly went to the door and stepped out onto the porch.

"Al," he called to the young man who was just at the gate to Roy's front yard. The young man turned and looked at him with a weary expression. He made a faint noise to acknowledge Roy, waiting for the question. "How is he?"

With just a moment's hesitation, Al finally came up with an answer. "How do you think?"

Roy gave a single nod and kept his head down as he went back into the house. Liam was already holding up a picture he'd drawn, this one of the Elrics and his cat. Well, Roy assumed that it was of the Elrics. The one was wearing a white button-up shirt with a blue t-shirt beneath and short tan hair just as Al had been dressed that day. The other was wearing a military uniform and had long blond hair.

"I bet they'll love that," Roy told him with a grin. "But right now, I've got plans for the day. Did you know the movie theater is getting ready to do a special kids' showing with shorts and cartoons in an hour?"

Liam, of course, shook his head and said that he hadn't.

"Well, they are," Roy said. "And I thought we could go and then get something to eat at the diner."

Gracia and Elysia would be at the movies as well, but Roy wasn't going to make the suggestion that they go out to eat with them as well. While he knew his son enjoyed time with the two, Roy wasn't going to enforce it on him. They could run into one another at the movies, and whether they sat with the Hughes women or went out with them after would be up to Liam.

"We can go? Now?" Liam asked.

Roy grinned. "Let me get out of uniform, and yes, we can go." He headed toward the stairs and quickly felt a set of hands pushing him at his lower back and pushing him forward.

"Hurry up, Dad!"

0o0o0o0

Ed walked in the door with a deep breath. He hadn't smelled that since his mother had died. It was a stew, one that Pinako made, but never quite made the same as her mother. This, however, smelled exactly as the young man remembered. Despite himself and his decidedly sour mood lately, it brought a fond smile to Ed's face.

He hung his uniform coat up next to the door, far away from Havoc's—one morning the older man had been called out particularly early and grabbed Ed's, nearly ripping the smaller coat when he tried to put it on, so now the coats were never near one another.

Ed made his way through the small apartment to get to the kitchen. "That smells great," he told his brother.

Al looked back at him with a smile, and the utter lack of maliciousness still hurt Ed as much as if his brother had shown that he blamed him still. "I was working on it when you called me to spend time with Liam. I wasn't sure I'd have it done in time, but you had an awfully late day."

"That's what happens when you oversee an entire department and you let your work back up on you for a week," Ed said. "Havoc home yet?"

Al shook his head. "No. Did he say he was going out? There's enough here for him too, but it'll keep if he isn't coming home."

Ed shrugged. "Is that mom's stew?" he asked.

"I think it's close," Al said. "Auntie taught me how to make it, then I played with it to make it taste like mom's. I think it's pretty close. Go ahead and sit down. It'll be ready soon."

"How was your day with Liam?" Ed asked. "And thanks for that."

"It wasn't so bad," Al said with a grin, but it faded quickly. "Though I think you're right. He seems very sad. Like…" Al paused and even though his back was to Ed right now, the blond could see his brother was searching for the right word and failing.

"Like a kicked puppy," Ed offered.

Al looked back at him and winced before agreeing.

"Then he's lucky that Mustang saved him from that." Al nodded once and began dishing out the stew.

There was the sound of the door opening and closing with quite a bit of huffing and puffing following it.

"You know," Ed called from the kitchen, "you wouldn't sound so winded if you didn't smoke so much."

There was a long pause before footsteps could be heard making their way out to the kitchen and Havoc appeared, looking a little worse for the wear. He immediately headed to the ice box and got himself a beer.

"I wouldn't sound so winded if your boyfriend hadn't decided I was an errand boy," Havoc said, then met Ed's eyes, obviously noticing the face the young man made at the mention of a boyfriend. "Sorry, if Mustang hadn't decided it."

"What happened?" Ed asked as the lieutenant sat down beside him, looking grateful for the bowl of soup that Al pushed in front of him while going up to get another one for himself. Ed couldn't help but glance up at his brother, at the kindness Al showed so easily. That kindness, when directed to others, reminded Ed why he'd kept his brother from the military; when it was directed at him, he felt horrible remorse for how he did it.

"He was pissy all day," Havoc said. Ed couldn't help the snicker at hearing the major general described as "pissy."

"All day?" he asked, realizing the implications of it after the brief amusement faded.

"Well, not quite all day," Havoc said, looking down at the stew.

"More like after I left?" Ed clarified. "So he was in a foul mood because of me?"

"Well… sort of," Havoc said. "It was about you, but because of me, I think. Mustang was mostly directing it all at me anyway."

"What did you do?" Al asked, sounding incredibly parental as he sat down with his bowl and looking pointedly at the older man.

"I think he was misinterpreting something, and even though I suspected he was, I didn't correct him. I think he saw… no, I know he saw the two of us walking in together, and I'm guessing also when we walked down the hall together, you know, with my arm around you."

"Yeah?" Ed asked, waiting for more elaboration, but before it could come, his own mind put the pieces together. "Oh. You're serious!" He felt anger boiling up inside of him. "He thought that you and I were… That asshole!"

"Pretty close to what I thought," Havoc said. "I mean, first of all, he should know me well enough to know I don't swing that way at all. Second of all, he should have had more faith in you than to think you'd find someone so quickly."

"Son of a bitch," Ed said, preparing to slam his fists onto the table, only to have it stopped by the calm hand of his brother and the frantic grab of the second lieutenant.

"So, when he told me to take care of you, I answered truthfully, but didn't correct what I knew he was thinking. I told him I would." Havoc kept hold of Ed's arm. "I would for any of my friends."

Ed scowled, but it was directed at the man who wasn't in the room, the one he wanted to throttle.

"I can correct him, but… I thought I'd leave that up to you," Havoc said sheepishly.

Ed spent a few moments trying to formulate an answer through his anger and frustration. "I tell you what," he said. "Don't. If you don't mind that he thinks we're… you know, I don't care. I really don't. Just don't lie to him if it comes down to it. I'd rather his own mind take care of filling in the blanks. It already has. Bastard."

"Hell, it irritates me he hasn't picked up that men don't do anything for me. At all." Havoc took a bite of the stew. "Oh well, maybe instead of playing hard to get, I'll stand a chance with the ladies if I play already gotten." He grinned.

"Shame on you, Havoc," Al said with a somewhat forced levity to his voice. "A few hours into your false relationship with brother and you're already planning to leave him for a woman."

Hearing his brother trying so hard to lighten the mood, Ed did his best to play along. He had a meal Al had worked hard to make for him, and Havoc was putting up with shit for him. It was the least Ed could do to hold his anger off for a bit.

"You're a very bad boyfriend, Havoc," Ed said, taking a bite of the stew and then making a moan that sounded unintentionally erotic.

"Promise me you'll never say that and follow it with that noise," Havoc said.

"Me too," Al said. "That was downright perverse, Brother."

"I'm sorry. The stew's good," Ed said, taking another bite and being transported back to Risembool for a few moments, sitting at his mother's table, far too young for problems with boyfriends and their sons, no automail, and no overriding guilt when he looked at Al.

"I take it that I got it right?" Al asked, to which Ed emphatically nodded.

0o0o0o0

"That was very nice of you to invite Elysia and me to come to the diner with you and Liam," Gracia said as they watched the children playing together at the park.

"It was Liam's idea," Roy said. "But it was the least we could do with how good you've both been."

"Liam's a pleasure to have around," Gracia said. "Though Elysia is a bit jealous that he's a year younger than her and was placed in her grade, even though she sticks up for him most of the time." She smiled as Elysia was busy showing Liam how to hang upside down from the monkey bars.

"Maes would be having a field day with them playing together," Roy said with a fond smile. "The day he found out Liam was on the way, he began planning their wedding." He chuckled. "I'm not quite ready to feel that old just yet."

"I think Maes would most likely be giving you a good thrashing for what has happened between you and Ed," Gracia said very casually.

"You too?" Roy asked.

"Don't look at me as though I've taken a side that isn't yours, Roy," Gracia said. "The age difference between the two of you was worrisome at first, but it turns out the person we all had to worry about acting immaturely was you." She shook her head. "But you know, the two of you seemed genuinely happy. And to see both of you suffering all because you couldn't tell Ed the truth, that you had a son, it baffles me, Roy. I thought you'd told him. You have no idea how many times I nearly revealed it to Ed, not knowing he had no clue."

"I know that I should have told him," Roy said. "Back when we were friends, but it became too hard after we started dating. Ed doesn't take well to having information kept from him."

"And you are the master of doing it," Gracia said, which made Roy look a bit like a fish. "Maes told me about the challenge between Flame and Fullmetal, which has become legendary without his help spreading the word. All because you didn't want to tell Ed about Dr. Marcoh from the Ishballan War?"

"I made a promise to Marcoh," Roy defended.

"It isn't just Marcoh, Roy," Gracia said. "You're a master secret-keeper. I've known you more than ten years, and you have been that way that long."

It was growing dark, meaning it was time to head home. Gracia obviously noticed as well, as she stood and straightened her skirt. "If you ever want to have a successful relationship with anyone, Roy, you're going to need to be honest with them. No secrets, no masks, none of that. Whether it's with Ed or with someone else."

Roy bristled at that and called for Liam to come over, that it was time to walk Gracia and Elysia home.

"I have to focus on Liam now. The rest can go to the backburner."

Gracia gave him a smile that could have easily said that he was the only one fooled when he said that.

And even Roy wasn't buying it.

0o0o0o0

Ed was very bad at showing gratitude, but he knew he'd have to do something for Al and Havoc. He couldn't begin to explain how much he appreciated the calming influence the two had, even to the point of helping him laugh when he'd been ready to slaughter Roy. They hadn't really remedied that, but at least stalled him from acting on it for a bit.

Initially, Ed had dealt with things with calm and some sadness. He had seen the surprise on Roy's face at the fact that Ed wasn't ranting and raving over the way he'd been wronged or trying to cut parts of Roy's anatomy off. To be honest, that had surprised Ed as well.

He was not so calm now. Now, he just wanted to hurt Roy. He couldn't believe the bastard had so little faith in Ed to think he would replace him so soon, maybe even assume Ed had replaced him before leaving the house. Walking to the nearest training center for military personnel, Ed walked by the park, noticing four figures walking toward him. Two of them were waving to get his attention, one watched, the other looked like he wanted to duck and cover.

Knowing that he didn't want to lose his temper in front of Gracia and Elysia and suspecting that he really shouldn't in front of the boy, Ed pretended he didn't see them and trudged onward.

Entering the training center, Ed was greeted by the man at the front desk, Lt. Davisson.

"Hi, Lieutenant Colonel," Davisson said with a faint salute. Ed gave a dismissive wave with his hand. Davisson knew well enough how much he hated being treated like an official. Particularly when he was working out. "If you need me to, I can spot you on the heavy bag."

Ed gave a quick nod as he slid off his trench. Beneath it, he wore his black tank and black pants.

Davisson smiled. He was grateful for Davisson, as it was clear the red-headed man knew exactly what Ed was going though but wasn't asking questions about how he was doing. The lieutenant walked over to the heavy bag and braced it. "Careful not to send me flying back into the wall," he said with a grin.

"I'll try," Ed said. One of the regulars laughed because the last time Ed had gotten angry, he'd knocked the person who'd been spotting him on the bag into the wall so hard he'd bruised a few ribs.

And then, Ed was allowed to lose himself, to focus on the pain and the way his body hit the bag. His state alchemist watch was tightly secured into his pocket.

Roy didn't tell him about Liam. _Double knuckle punch_. Roy never said "I love you" though Ed professed it on more than one occasion_. Left hook_. Al was here being so damned nice when Ed still wasn't telling him the truth himself. _Front snap kick_. Roy thought that he would move on again right after they broke up. _Palm heel strike_. Roy never _fucking_ told him he had a son! _Crescent kick._

Ed took a break, knowing that if he wasn't careful, he was going to hurt Davisson.

"Giving me a training too, Elric," Davisson said with a good-natured smile.

With a nod and a "thank you," Ed headed over to the water fountain and took a drink. Davisson didn't move from his spot there, as though waiting for him to come back to the punching bag, which Ed more than likely would. He hadn't gotten his frustration out of his system.

"Move it shrimp."

Ed could feel a funny little tick at his eye. He'd gotten over his height issues mostly. Part of it was finally hitting 5'4" before he stopped growing, part of it was maturity. But, it didn't mean he liked being reminded of it, or that he wouldn't kick someone's ass that didn't have Ed's permission—or as close as he gave it when it came to short jokes—to make fun of it.

Ed took another drink of water, ignoring the man behind him. He was thirsty. Just those few minutes at the bag had him sweating, and it wasn't worth acknowledging this man.

Of course, that wasn't satisfactory for the oaf behind him, who grabbed hold of Ed's arm. "I said to move."

Ed turned to find a man a bit shorter than Lieutenant Colonel Armstrong. From the looks of him and the watch this man wore at his hip, he was probably part of Armstrong's detachment. Where Ed was in charge of research, Armstrong oversaw the engineers, both alchemists and regular military.

And they had just gotten back from a town near Creta that had suffered an earthquake. Ed vaguely remembered this man from last year's exam. It seemed somewhat natural that he wouldn't know Ed, but the young man was sure to make sure he did after today.

"Major, I don't think you want to start something with the—" Davisson started.

"What?" the man asked. "We're both alchemists. Though, this little pipsqueak looks like he's in research to me."

"Major…" Davisson tried again. "This is a very bad idea."

"It's fine," Ed said with a smirk. He'd been needing a way to let loose his aggressions. "Just notify the lieutenant colonel so he can have someone collect the body."

"You're a confidant little guy, aren't you?" the man asked.

"Yup," Ed said. "I'm going to ask you again, are you sure you want to fight me just over me not moving at a fountain?"

The man walked over to the sparring area of the center as his answer. He climbed between the ropes that partitioned it off from the rest of the center.

Davisson walked over to Ed as a warning. "He's been here since the lieutenant colonel's unit came in. He picks the fights based on people he thinks he can beat."

"Lucky for me my sparing partners have been twice his size."

He smiled and looked again at the large man.

"Do you even know who I am?"

"Some alchemist without the physical strength to rebuild cities like I do," the major said.

Ed laughed at that and easily swung his body over the ropes. "Davisson here has tried to tell you repeated times who I am and I have tried as well, no more warnings."

The man looked Ed up and down before laughing. "Warnings?" he asked.

"Well, I'll even take it easy on you. Don't want you calling foul because I hit you with automail." Ed took a starting stance and waited for the big lug to come at him first.

There was no finesse in the larger man's moves. It was like facing down a charging rhino, not that Ed had ever done that before. Luckily, a rhino had more intelligence than this man seemed to. Really, it was a wonder he was an alchemist at all, particularly one capable of passing the state exam.

Ed dodged him easily before beginning to fight in earnest. He was careful to keep his right arm out of it, not to mention his left leg.

"You do realize this is my regular gym, don't you? You're just visiting here," Ed said, taking a moment to indicate the growing crowd. "They're an audience for me, not for you."

"They probably just want to watch you get your ass kicked. Working in a lab while the rest of us are in the real world," the major managed before Ed punched him in the gut.

"Try an office, asshole," Ed said, trying to let this idiot know he was messing with a superior officer. It wasn't sinking in.

"Desk jockey. Even better."

The man took a swing, and Ed blocked it with his right arm before hitting him with the left again. "What do they call you? What big, official name did you get?"

"The Granite Alchemist," the man said, trying again.

"I remember you," Ed said, flipping back and away from the older man, as he recalled the monolith that had risen from the testing area. Really, he knew this was the man all along. "You're the one who made the giant phallic symbol in the testing arena." The man gave him a momentary blank look. "A giant penis, jackass."

Ed knew this was going to go on too long, and he didn't want the idiot to actually get hurt. Despite how much he wanted to hurt him, Ed knew that it would look bad on him as a lieutenant colonel. He slid behind him and leapt up to latch onto the man's neck with his automail arm.

"Take a guess what they call me," Ed said.

"You said you'd lay off on the automail," the man said.

"Those were my rules, not yours. I can break my own rules. Been doing it for years to my superior officers' anyway." Ed chuckled. "Any idea what they might call me, idiot?"

The man tried to slam Ed back against the ropes, but the young man let go and got himself out of harms way. "I don't care what they call you."

"Might want to start," Ed said. "Because they're all cheering it."

And like that, the large man stopped and listened to the cheers of "Fullmetal! Fullmetal!" That, without focus, sounded like drowning cheers.

The major visibly paled and looked down at Ed. "Still interested in finishing this fight? Because, regardless of how it turns out, I'm still reporting you to Lieutenant Colonel Armstrong. He needs to know that he's got a loose cannon as part of his outfit."

"Lieutenant Colonel," the man managed, but he looked as though he still doubted it. Ed rolled his eyes and clapped his hands, making his automail transform, then returned it to its usual form. "I'm done."

"I might be in charge of research now," Ed said. "But I'm always going out into the field. And let me give you a word of advice: Don't pick on someone wearing automail. They've gone through more pain, and shown more strength than you could probably muster in all your miserable life, Major."

Ed easily climbed out of the ring and went to get his coat from the hanger at the front. "Well, it's been fun."

Davisson gave Ed a small smile as he left, and Ed felt through that fight and putting that man in his place, he'd regained a little of the dignity and control he'd felt he'd lost since he split from Roy.

It was a good feeling, even if the ache remained.


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13**

**Confrontations**

Roy was beginning to grow accustomed to Alphonse's presence at headquarters, though he couldn't help but suspect Al was there for more than his brother. Roy really hated thinking that of the young man who had never seemed to have an ulterior motive in the past. The sad thing was that Roy remembered the clash from years before. He remembered the way the brothers had fought. He remembered the betrayed look on Al's face when he'd heard that Ed didn't support Al becoming a state alchemist.

Though Roy had come to accept the fact of Al's presence there, he was not accustomed to seeing him talking to one of the military's most over-achieving generals. Brigadier General Noolan had been vying for Ed's position for the last two years, and Roy knew that any conversations between those two would not mean anything good for the elder Elric. Roy stepped just a bit closer, enough to hear their conversation.

"I'd like to talk to you," Noolan said to Al. "In private."

Roy cleared his throat, getting the attention of both men. "Brigadier General. Alphonse." He nodded his head to each of them. He hoped his presence would stop this little chat, so he could pull Al to the side later. Instead, the other man seemed pleased by his presence.

"Major general," he said. "Perhaps you could join us." The smile the silver-haired man gave was positively slimy.

"Come to my office," Roy said. He felt more comfortable talking about whatever this was going to be in his own territory.

That seemed to throw the brigadier off of his game, and Roy fought the smirk at that. He ushered the two men into the office, ignoring the strange looks he was getting from his team. Havoc, in particular, was sending him a glare that seemed to say he suspected Roy was somehow betraying Ed. The look Roy shot back at him was no less intense than the blond's. Things between him and the other man had grown tense over the last few days, and they didn't seem to be getting better anytime soon.

Roy waited for Al and the brigadier general to come in before shutting the door behind him. Much to Roy's irritation, he noticed Noolan had the gall to sit at _his_ desk. "The reason I was hoping to talk to you both," Noolan said, "is because I believe I have found discrepancies in your application to become a state alchemist."

Looking down at the man and clearing his throat, he made a small move of his head to tell the older man to get the hell out of his seat. The man had enough military decorum to at least know he'd made a mistake even if he didn't have enough of it not to do it in the first place. With a brief apology, Noolan stood and gave Roy back his seat.

"What kind of discrepancy?" Roy asked, eyes narrowing.

"Well, looking at previous test records, Alphonse is the only person to take the state alchemist test and complete the test, not to mention pass it, two times. However, I feel there was a line of questioning that came from his brother that was uncalled for, and the comments made by the Lieutenant Colonel seem incorrect given the depth of the knowledge that Alphonse has."

Roy sat at his desk, elbows resting on top with his arms making an upward V with his fingers interlocked at the top. He tried to emit an air of calm though he was silently seething that this man kept referring to Al by his first name. "And…?"

"And I feel that keeping Alphonse from becoming a state alchemist would be a crime."

The look on Al's face was unreadable, but the smallest glint of joy at those words seemed to speak volumes, either for the reinforcement that Noolan's words gave at Al's own abilities or at the hope that he could one day become a state alchemist.

"I suspect when the Lieutenant Colonel said his brother did not have the level of competency necessary not because he believed that, but perhaps out of jealousy. It is my understanding that the Fullmetal Alchemist did not complete the written exam and that his percentage was not as high as his younger brother's during that initial test."

"It was by a matter of a quarter of a percentage point," Roy said, remembering well his surprise at that. "I also think that if Fullmetal were given that same written exam, not the one that he has drafted recently, you would find he would get nearly every answer correct." After all, Ed had tapped into the ultimate knowledge given to him by the gate in the process of taking that written exam.

"Perhaps, but you cannot honestly tell me that you feel that Alphonse deserves to be kept from achieving his state alchemy license."

Al had remained silent, but his large brown eyes were now attentively watching Roy.

"I understand that you supported him at the time, but I thought that perhaps now…" Noolan let that statement hang. It was obvious enough what he meant without actually saying it. He thought that now that Roy and Ed had broken up, that they weren't even friendly at this point, perhaps he would like to see Ed crash and burn.

"Regardless of what the Lieutenant Colonel's motives were at the time," Roy said, "and I do not think they were jealousy, I support his decision to keep Alphonse from entering the state alchemists." He watched as the young man's hands that had been hanging limply at his sides began to tense, hands tightening.

"Alphonse has a great deal of practical knowledge, even the ability to use that knowledge, but it is not his alchemy skills that are my concern." He met Al's eyes with a cool expression. This was the truth, and it was something he and Ed had both agreed upon in the early days. "Alphonse Elric is not military material. I think he could make a fine civilian researcher, which we have begun using since the Lieutenant Colonel took over the position that _I_ decided he had earned and was more than qualified for.

"I honestly hope that you are not continuing to pursue this, Alphonse, and that this is the Brigadier General's idea alone. If you are still trying to pursue your state alchemist's certification, you are wasting your time. I do not believe that you have a place in the military. While I might trust you to support me in a fight, I do not trust you to provide cover for me in a war." The words were harsh, and Roy actually saw Al wince, but it was about time someone told him the truth. He only regretted that they had to be said in the presence of this weasel of a man—one of far too many in the military like him.

"Brigadier General, regardless of where things stand between Edward and I personally, I trust his judgment professionally. I recommend you leave. I want to speak to Alphonse in private."

"Sir, I question your decision in this," Noolan said, with the "Sir" uttered in a way it sounded painful for the man to even form the word.

"But it is my decision, and you will find that others will support me and the Lieutenant Colonel in it." Roy then simply pointed to the door and waited for Noolan to leave. Roy had a feeling that Noolan wouldn't leave this alone, but Roy had rank and the title of hero in his favor. If he had to, he would go in person to visit each general to explain the sort of underhanded moves that Noolan was attempting. He would do it in person, because the eye patch did get him sympathy if it got him nothing else.

He watched the older man leave the room and shut the door behind him. Al still said nothing, and that showed far more restraint than his brother ever had, but it also disturbed and frightened Roy in a way that Ed's anger never had.

"I allowed your brother to enter the military at the age of twelve," he said slowly. "It is something I doubt I will ever stop regretting. I watched as every bit of youthful innocence and faith in humankind was wiped away from your brother's eyes. I watched as, slowly, he became a fighter and then a killer. On the battlefield, your brother is fearless and he is cold and calculating in a way I do not believe you could ever be."

"The military would have trained me to be—" Al finally interjected.

"Yes, the military would have trained you to be like your brother, and for all the feelings that I have for him," Roy said, not even stumbling over the admission that he did still care for Ed, "I would trade anything to have kept him from becoming what he is now. I cannot undo what I have done, and I have regretted that from the day I saw his face after Nina was killed. I wanted to keep his watch after he handed it back to me, but he was too driven. There was a higher goal, and the sacrifice he paid was becoming a true member of the military.

"You have no higher goal, no brother to save, no limbs to return. You have no great quest that only the military can help you achieve, and there are job options available to you that didn't exist three years ago. Those are all thanks to your brother and what he has done with government-funded research. There is no reason for you to pursue becoming a state alchemist and either become a killer or crack when you finally have to take the life of another. Not now. Not even then.

"If you decide to continue to pursue this matter with Brigadier General Noolan and let this man drag your brother through the mud by trying to say he was doing anything other than protecting you and those who might have to fight alongside you, I will ensure that you are banned from entering Central Headquarters until you come to your senses." Roy didn't even realize he had stood so that he could at least come close to meeting Al in the eye—how could he be so tall with Ed for a brother?—until he finished his speech to the young man. His hands were now gripping his desk, and he looked very close to leaning over it.

"You think my brother was protecting me? By making me think I was a miserable failure of an alchemist?" Al asked. That contained fury was growing to irritate Roy. "Those questions he asked at my oral test. He practically outted us both for what we did."

Roy nodded. Ed had asked some harsh questions of all the men that year and every year since. It only seemed worse for Al, knowing their background. "He didn't ask you anything different than he did of anyone else," Roy said. "You were the one who stumbled over the answers and looked incredibly unprepared for them."

It took Al a moment to recover from that, and for once, Roy was glad. Let Al take this out on him. "And my record," Al said. "He refused to give me any recommendation."

"And you are surprised by that?" Roy asked. "To let you become a state alchemist would have been to let you become a weapon, to kill or be killed. Do you think he'd sign off on that so easily?"

He shook his head. "You need to talk to him, Alphonse. This needs aired out between the two of you. And soon. Look at you," he said, pointing to the young man's still-closed hands. "You are so furious at me, at the situation, and probably at your brother, your knuckles are white and your arms are shaking."

"You're one to talk," Al snapped.

"Whichever cliché you prefer, pick one. 'Learn from my mistakes.' 'Do as I say, not as I do,'" Roy said with a shrug. "Whatever it is, Ed needs you. Far more than he ever thought he needed me. This thing between the two of you, all over a job you really are not qualified for, has to stop."

"I could be a great state alchemist!" Al finally yelled after Roy's endless barrage of seemed insults at him. It was strange to hear Al raise his voice, let alone do it with so much anger behind it. Three years worth of pent-up anger.

"You are not a killer and I will not be responsible for another Elric becoming one. And you would have to kill, Alphonse. Maybe from afar, maybe at point blank. Maybe one, maybe dozens at a time. Take a good look at this face, at your brother's face. Look at my team and Lieutenant Colonel Armstrong. Ask yourself if you want to see that looking back at the mirror at you."

Al turned on his heel and left. Roy couldn't say for certain that he'd made an impression on the young man, but he certainly hoped so.

0o0o0o0

When Second Lieutenant Fuery came into Ed's office, he acknowledged him with a small smile. Two weeks now, two weeks since he'd left Roy's house and decided to have nothing more than a professional relationship with the man. Ed had finally come to some sort of acceptance. He didn't understand nor accept what Roy had done, but rather, he accepted that what they'd had was over and done with.

"The reports from Central library," Fuery said. "Also, reports from Majors Brocklehurst, Champlain, and Wolford."

Ed nodded. "Thank you, Lieutenant," he said.

"Shezka wondered when you might want to come over again for dinner," Fuery said. "She enjoyed having you there." He chuckled. "I think she liked having someone there who enjoyed books as much as she does."

"Just certain types of books," Ed said.

"Yeah, but different types from the detective and scary stories I read," the bespectacled man replied. "I swear her appetite for knowledge is unstoppable. I just keep waiting for her brain to suddenly fill up and decide it can't take any more."

Ed chuckled and nodded his head. "I'll see what is going on with Al and Havoc. I'm sure they both could use a break from me."

Fuery chuckled and headed for the door to Ed's office.

"Kain?" he asked, the name sounding far funnier than using the man's last name. With a surprised look, the dark-haired man turned and faced him again. "Thank you."

"Thank Shezka. It is her idea," Fuery said with a smile. Ed knew it was otherwise. The whole team had taken their turns being around him, spending time with Ed. He was appreciative for every one of them. He smiled at Fuery as the man left and began looking over the library's report. Ed was watchful of the books that got checked out of the library. It gave him a better idea of what his researchers were planning to work on and even suggest other titles that could be of use. It also helped him guide the ones away from the areas of alchemy that could prove dangerous.

Nothing was out of the ordinary for the first few pages. Ed was actually quite pleased to see the library was getting this amount of use, as the monthly record was once only half this thick.

However, when he saw that Shou Tucker's research had been checked out by Major General Mustang, Ed saw red. What the hell was that man doing with Tucker's research? If it was anything short of burning it, he would kill the man.

Without thought, Ed grabbed the stack of papers in one hand and stormed from his office. He was going to kill the bastard. And he was going to enjoy it.

No one dared to cross him as he made his way down the hallway. They had seen his usually temper before, but even those he knew seemed genuinely frightened.

Without pause as he passed by Hawkeye's desk and the office where Breda and Havoc worked, Ed made it to the all-too-familiar wooden doors, which he roughly threw open.

"What the hell were you doing with Shou Tucker's notes?" Ed asked as he slammed the door behind him.

Roy looked up at him, startled at first, then visibly going on the defensive. "That isn't any of your business."

Ed was over to the desk in no time, slamming the report down on it as he grabbed Roy's shoulder to make him look at it. "I get all records of the research done at the library. To my surprise, I see your name there. Checking out Shou Tucker's notes and research." He pointed to the item on the sheet to draw the man's attention to it before grabbing him roughly by the shoulder, twisting him in the leather chair, to look at him. "Answer me! What the hell are you doing with his work?"

"Get your hands off of me," Roy said, looking as though he was losing grasp on his sense of calm.

"Were you going to combine your son and his pet like Shou did to Nina, asshole? Or did you have other—" At that, Ed found himself slammed against the wall with a force he didn't know the older man had.

"Don't you ever, ever talk about my son like that!" Roy said, holding Ed there, his dark eye piercing as he looked down at the young man.

"Tucker looked like the perfect parent on the outside. You never even saw your son more than a few times a year. Why would you be more attached than Tucker was?"

Ed found himself being struck in the face, hard. His words had been a low blow, and he knew it, but he had to find out what the hell the man was doing with notes on creating a human chimera.

"I love my son," Roy said.

"Then tell me why the hell you are messing around with the stuff that son of a bitch used!"

"This is my business why I need it," Roy said, his voice dark and low as he spoke. "Leave it alone!"

Ed was too good of a fighter to stay cornered like this, and he quickly turned the tables on the older man and had him pressed against the wall. Slammed, more like, from the sound of Roy's head smacking off the wood paneling. "After Nina Tucker, I swore I would never see that happen again!"

"Then where the hell were you when those same documents were taken out of the Eastern Library?" Roy asked, shoving Ed back. "Don't get self-righteous with me because you have made this some kind of goal of yours. If that were true, you'd have gotten rid of them from every library or be checking each of the state alchemy libraries in Amestris. But you missed one, Ed."

Ed scowled at Roy. "What do you mean? Eastern Library? I get their stuff all the time. Have been for a year. No one's checked out any of Tucker's notes. No one but you, you bastard."

"Then they're already out," Roy said. The fight seemed to leave him in one fell swoop. "More than a year with those books." He ran a hand through his dark hair and said the word Ed couldn't remember hearing him ever say. "Fuck!"

"Who has Tucker's shit?" Ed asked sharply, shoving Roy to get a reaction when no answer came immediately. "Who has it?"

Roy walked over to his desk and pulled out a stack of notes, most written by him, but on top was a design Ed never wanted to see. It was backwards, but he still managed to recognize the symbol.

"Who drew this?" Ed asked. This wasn't the common design. This was one that was used to create perfect chimeras. The ones that had been used on Martel and the others who had followed Greed. These had to be alchemically tattooed on someone's body, a painful process in itself, before being used to transmute the person and the animal together. "It's nearly complete. Who drew it?"

If Roy was getting involved in this kind of thing… Ed touched the drawing, his left hand tracing over a bold letter. It was waxy, like black crayon.

"Who did this, Roy?" Ed looked again at the unsteady hand that had drawn the design. A child's hand. "Liam?"

Roy nodded.

"Fuck," Ed said, repeating Roy's earlier sentiment. "His mom?" Again a nod, and again Ed repeated Roy's word choice. "We need supplies then. I'll stop by the library. I think I can find a couple of the books I need. I'll stop by your house tonight. After he's gone to bed. What time is that?"

"Nine," Roy said, looking bewildered.

"Nine-thirty, then," Ed said. "I'll be over then. I'll bring what I can from the library. You gather whatever you have. And check Ed the cat too. Just in case."

"Why… What are you…"

"I'm helping your kid, Idiot," Ed said. "Get your shit together. The library will only be open a little longer. I've got to go." He headed from the room, leaving the report on Roy's desk.

Ed was going to help him. Roy hadn't asked; he hadn't expected it could be a possibility. But Ed was going to help. Even as his body felt lighter at that fact, Roy's gut wanted to eat itself out in guilt.


	14. Research

Ed hurried from the room, trying to remember what he could of that form of alchemy from his studies. He knew that Tucker had had quite a bit in his collection about it, but it had been years since Ed had seen any of it. It didn't help that Ed had done his best since Tucker to try to put everything about that time from his mind. Even if he couldn't really forget Nina.

He moved quickly from the doorway, not really noticing as some greeted him, others stared. He walked through the halls, nearly oblivious as his focus was solely in his own mind. His body was on autopilot Ed passed Havoc, but paid him no notice until the older man grabbed his arm, stopping him momentarily.

"Ed, are you okay?" he asked. "Your lip's bleeding."

Ed darted his tongue out and found the coppery taste of blood lingering on it. Roy really hit him hard, but Ed knew he'd been verbally hitting below the belt when he'd commented on Roy's parenting skills. Realistically, Roy could have tried harder to stay near his son or have his son with him, but at least he visited the boy and seemed to love him dearly. Even at the end, Ed couldn't be sure his father didn't sacrifice himself more because of weariness to live on without his mother or to save Ed and Al. Al liked to believe the latter. Something in Hohenheim's eyes that night made Ed think it was the former.

"Did he do that to you?" Havoc asked, looking frighteningly like an older brother at the moment. His voice was low, quiet enough that others in the hall wouldn't hear, but the look in his eyes said that if Ed wasn't careful of his choice of words to follow, he'd hurt Mustang.

"We argued and it got a little out of hand, though you might want to check he doesn't have a concussion," Ed said quietly. "I slammed him against the wall a bit hard."

Ed made sure to omit who did what first, and just did his best to ensure that Havoc understood that he'd given as good as he got.

"I have to go to the library," Ed said. "It could be a long night for me. I have no idea when I will get home."

"Doesn't the library, you know, _close_?" Havoc handed him a handkerchief, one he knew the older man kept around for crying women. Havoc swore that being able to offer a distressed woman his handkerchief made a lasting, positive impression on her. Being that Ed had no interest in making a lasting impression of the type Havoc meant, he couldn't really say.

"After the library closes, I'm grabbing food and heading to the bastard's house," Ed said. "He needs my help. If you see Al, tell him I'll probably need him too, if he's willing. Tell him I'll explain the whole thing tomorrow once I have time to see the extent of the problem."

"Do you think it's a good idea, you and the chief working together?" Havoc asked, looking down at the split lip.

"No choice," Ed said, brusquely. "This isn't for me. It's bigger than that, so I think we can keep from going at one another. Besides, I'm a big boy, I can handle myself." He pulled himself from Havoc's loose grip. "Gotta go. See you tonight. Maybe tomorrow." And with that, Ed was down the hall and out the door.

Ed ran from the building like a man possessed. His mind was already going a mile a minute. He recognized the symbol that Mustang had shown him, both what it was for and how it had to be applied. The problem was that the kind of alchemy involved had been out of use for well over a century, save for the rare case of someone like Zolf Kimblee. What might be recorded on it would be difficult to find, even just the small amount necessary to trigger the knowledge crammed into his head by the Gate.

0o0o0o0

Roy realized he was behaving like he was back in the Academy once again, as he'd ordered a pizza, of all things, and plenty of snacks, coffee and soda to keep him and Ed going through the night. It was as though he was once more cramming for a major exam, but there was an edge to it as he knew this was a thousand times more important. There was also a giddiness that he hated to acknowledge because he knew he was going to be working with Ed on something involving alchemy.

He'd never had the opportunity to work with the teen quite like this. They might comment on one another's work, or at night, they would pick one another's brains, but Roy knew this would be different. He was going to see Ed's mind in its glory, and as a fellow alchemy nerd—though he hid it better than most—that made Roy more excited than he should.

Forcibly sobering himself, Roy thought about the boy who had just gone to bed with his cat laying across the top of the bed. This was about him, not about Ed or behaving like he was twenty all over again. This was about his son and the circle that spread across his small back. This was about the danger that Liam was in as long as it was there.

The knock at Roy's door brought him quickly out of this thoughts. He quickly went to answer it, finding Ed loaded down with what appeared to be a few dozen books.

Awkwardly, he helped the young man with the books and ushered him into the library. He's already put some pens and papers next to Ed's chair—Roy had purchased it three years ago, but it had become the spot he was most likely to find his then-lover and would forever be Ed's

"Thank you for this," Roy said. He set the books down on the large mahogany desk and looked back at Ed, noticing the scabbed lip. "Shit… did I do—"

"Yeah, you did," Ed said as he set the books next to the stack Roy had carried in. He continued before Roy could make any apologies for it. "How's your head, by the way?"

"I have a bit of a goose egg at the back, but I've had worse," Roy said, his hand going up to gingerly rub at the spot.

"Look, what I said…"

"Doesn't matter," Roy said. It didn't. He deserved worse than that from the young man. He was honestly surprised his son didn't feel as though he had let him down. Maybe that would come with age, once he realized just how much his father had failed him.

"So should we get to work?" Roy asked. "I've got a pizza on its way and food and drink if this ends up being a late night."

Ed made an approving face. "I grabbed a sandwich earlier, but after lugging around those books, pizza sounds good." He paused and looked at the two stacks on the desk. "It might not be a bad idea to catch you up on what I already know."

Roy nodded and watched as Ed instinctually went to his chair, but not lounging across it with the familiarity he'd had once before. That thought stung, even if he knew it was his own damned fault. "Alchemy goes through cycles of being used for general welfare and being used as a weapon. Hundreds of years ago, they were in a weapon phase and figured out how to enhance their own abilities and specialties through tattoos. For example, you might have your fire symbols on the back of your hand, instead of on your gloves, enhancing your alchemy.

"It worked well enough, but eventually someone decided that human alchemy would make it work better. Using natural melanin in the body, they began creating tattoos that were actually a part of the alchemist."

Roy frowned. "So you're saying that that thing on my son's back is… a giant mole?"

"More or less," Ed said. "But it's a deep one. If you have it cut surgically, it will likely scar in the same pattern, if not come through again later. That was because once a tattoo like that was put on someone's body, it wasn't supposed to be removed. It was only ever done for two reasons: to give a fighter a strong weapon that could never be lost and even act on the alchemist's instinct or to torture a prisoner or victim." Ed managed to keep his voice steady, but Roy felt sick at the thought of what Liam had been through, at what the potential for that symbol on the boy's back could be.

"The process is incredibly painful," Ed continued. "But for the fighters, it was worth it. For the prisoners, well, no one really cared because whatever the symbols were for was going to be painful anyway. The problem really was that if someone captured a fighter with those symbols. Think Zolf Kimblee, since he had the same thing. If they weren't killed on sight, they were a danger, just like Kimblee.

"I know they must have had a way to get rid of the symbols alchemically. I just don't know how."

There was a knock at the door and Roy numbly stood from his chair to go an answer it, mind racing as it processed what Ed had told him. This wasn't just a tattoo with ink. It was a part of his son.

0o0o0o0

Ed regretted the things he'd said about Roy as a parent. The look on the man's face as he'd explained what those circles were for had been so pained it hurt for Ed to see, knowing that as he continued . With the older man now gone, the calm demeanor that Ed had possessed while explaining disappeared. Memories of the little girl he'd all but adopted as his own little sister morphed with her dog flooded his mind until he thought he might drown in them.

He thought of Marta too. How long had it been since he'd thought of the woman? How long had it been since he recalled her kindness and how she had died?

Ed remembered asking her about how she was transformed, had asked for the details she didn't really want to tell two boys. She had described the process as best someone who was a layman to alchemy could. She had explained how it felt as though they had carved designs on her body, but when she watched them do the same to the snake, she saw the painful things had been a tattoo sort of substance. It was the only way to create a perfect chimera, they had told her. The only way that the melding between man and beast would not be a lifetime of agony.

If the circle was still on the boy's back, then it needed removed. It had only been a few symbols away from completion, just one quick transmutation to put those symbols in place, and then mesh him together with an animal. It made Ed's stomach lurch and he wasn't sure he could stomach the pizza he knew had just arrived.

He would have to ask Roy the name of Liam's mother, to see if it was anything familiar. Maybe so he could hunt the woman down for himself.

Roy returned with the box of pizza.

"Roy…" Ed looked at the box, appetite gone. "The symbol… it is definitely on Liam? Just as he drew it?"

"On his back," Roy said with a solemn nod. "No additional symbols, but it's close enough to being complete from what I've read."

"Shit." He drew his feet up onto the chair, curling his body into the green chair. "Shit," he repeated.

"My thoughts exactly," Roy said.

"What is her name?" Ed said. "Liam's mother."

"Karen Tyler, formerly a major."

"I remember her. She was trying to develop weapons," Ed said. "I signed the forms that dropped her military funding. Was this because of that?" He knew that technically he had just done his job, but the thought that he might have provided the impetus for the woman to go after her own child was more than a little unsettling.

"It isn't your fault," Roy said. "That process of kicking her out of the state military had already begun."

Ed looked up at Roy, still surprised after all these years that the man was able to read him so well. "We're going to have to get to work then." He got up from his seat and grabbed a small stack of the books he'd set on Roy's desk and began reading. He saw out of the corner of his eye as Roy did the same.

There had been a time when Ed had wanted to work on a project with the older man as their professional—and personal, to be perfectly honest—personalities worked well together. He had pictured something like improving farming techniques, irrigation and well drilling maybe. He had always envisioned something that would benefit the people. Not in a million years would he have pictured this would be the project that would finally bring them to work together.

0o0o0o0

It was well after midnight by the time Roy admitted that his eye was killing him and he couldn't read another page without a break. The pizza sat untouched, as it seemed neither he nor Ed could manage to eat anything. He stood and rubbed at the overstrained eye. He wanted to work harder, to match the young man, but he simply couldn't do it any longer. With only one functioning eye, it grew overworked much too easily, and he could no longer ignore the headache that made his entire head throb.

Roy walked over to Ed and put his hand on the teen's flesh shoulder. "Can I get you something to drink? Or heat up the pizza?"

Ed looked over at the box. "I don't feel very hungry. But I could use a drink. Coffee if you have it."

Roy nodded. "It won't take long to make." He let his hand linger for a moment, trying to relish the fact that he was allowed, if just temporarily, to touch the young man in a way that wasn't slamming him into the wall of his office. Thinking back on it made Roy once again regret that it enough as it was that the fat lip the teen was sporting was all thanks to him.

Slowly, he moved away from Ed and walked from the room. Though there was an uncomfortable air, this was the first time in the last few weeks that he felt like his home was at rights. It was strange how it took Ed's presence for that to happen.

Roy was also somewhat amazed at how much faith he held in Ed's abilities to find an answer. For the first time in months, he felt incrementally more relaxed. While there was no denying that he was still on edge, he just felt confident that Ed would find the solution they needed.

As he walked into the kitchen, Roy went straight for the new pack of vanilla coffee. Ed had always liked the extra flavoring, not to mention the fact that it was considerably sweeter than Roy's usual brand. He put the coffee grounds into the percolator along with the water and got it going on the stove. Roy didn't have the space for the large automatic coffee machine at work, nor did he think it made a very good cup of coffee.

Rubbing his temples, the man waited for the familiar noise of the percolator as he walked to the medicine cabinet. He had begun keeping his medicines out in the kitchen because it was easier to keep them out of Liam's reach and to child proof the doors. He fumbled a few times with the small latch before finally getting the door open. He needed something to kill the pain, something that wasn't in his—also child-proofed—liquor cabinet. Getting out two little white pills and filling a glass with tap water, he took them and prayed to some distant pharmaceutical god that they worked quickly.

When he heard the familiar popping/clopping sound of the percolator, Roy got out two coffee cups. While the vanilla coffee wasn't his favorite, he could drink it if he had to.

"I've got it!" a shout rang through the downstairs, nearly making Roy drop the coffee pot he'd just picked up. In no time, Roy was faced with an enthusiastic Ed. The older man had seen this look on Ed's face before. That exuberant face was one of Ed's most alluring, and now it and the hope that it held drew Roy in more than ever before. "I've found out how they got rid of the symbols."

Roy carefully set down the coffee pot, not trusting his grip to remain as strong as before.

"They didn't get rid of them, per se, because they were too important to just remove from a person. Sometimes there was a lot of study that went into each symbol. They would transfer them to other people. And you can transfer them in entirety and in parts. Roy, we could get them off your son—"

And before his brain could hear more than the fact that the symbols could be eliminated from Liam's back, he rushed forward and kissed Ed out of gratitude.

0o0o0o0

Ed was so damned shocked by the kiss that the book he'd carried out with him to the kitchen crashed to the floor. Naturally, he needed to pull away. Very quickly. Obviously, this was not what he needed to be doing, this wasn't beneficial to the boy, nor to either of them.

However, his body wasn't listening to what was natural and obvious. His hands fiercely threaded themselves through Roy's hair and gave a tug. His mind was screaming at his traitorous body. He needed to stop this now.

So why wasn't he?

Roy's hands were getting grabby as well, holding onto Ed's face and waist, holding him close. It was so damned easy to just fall back into the routine, and as Ed was edging Roy closer to the wall, he really didn't care. Just a kiss and Ed was already getting hard. It really had been too long since they'd had sex, since he'd been inside the older man—longer still since Roy had been inside of him.

Well, he didn't care until Roy managed to gather his wits about him.

"I'm sorry," he said as he pulled back. "I didn't think."

Ed still held tightly to Roy's hair. He stared at the man owlishly for a few moments before finally reacting and pulling his hand away.

"Fuck," he said, trying to move backwards from the man, while ignoring the erection that was fairly obvious despite the coverage of his pants.

"I'm sorry," Roy repeated. "I really shouldn't have…" He bent down and picked up the book Ed had dropped. "I had no right."

"You're damned right you didn't," Ed said. He was panting, aroused and pissed at Roy and at himself.

Roy handed him the book. "So now what do we do?"

The look in the older man's eyes seemed to be questioning about more than just the transmutation circle currently on Liam's back, but Ed wasn't about to answer to anything else. "We need to figure out who's going to get the circle transferred to them."

"I am," Roy said with that tone that said there would be no room for question or disagreement.

"Fine," Ed said. After all, what Roy didn't know wouldn't hurt him. "Then let's get to work."


	15. Uncomfortable Sleep

Focus on their work was evading Ed as his lip continued a steady thump of dull pain. The fat lip that Roy had given him earlier combined with the kiss had made it sting, then ache, now, Ed could feel his every heartbeat. With each throb came a reminder of Roy's lips on his, of times when they wouldn't just stop with a kiss. And it was unbelievably frustrating to be in a room with the man and know that nothing was going to happen. Nothing… because he wasn't going to let it. First of all, it was too important that he at least _try_ to focus on Liam and the transmutation circles. Secondly, he didn't want to open up that mess. Not now, not ever.

So, Ed again looked down at the papers in front of him. He saw the drawing that Liam had done, and there was the slightest niggling sensation in his mind. That feeling that he knew something about this transmutation circle, but that it wasn't something readily accessible. The things that the Gate had imported, crammed and stuffed to overflowing into his head usually felt like that. He only remembered them if there was a trigger, like this drawing, which would wheedle its way into his head and slowly extract the knowledge from wherever it was stored.

He could feel the usual headache coming on as well. It always did when he worked like this, relying partly on the memory that the Gate had given him. The research he could physically find on this circle was simple and straightforward. Two transmutation circles that would be linked together through a simple transmutation circle. It was a simple process, however there were a few pieces missing from Liam's back if this was the case.

And somehow, instinct was telling him that this part of the circle was complete.

Ed scrambled for a pen and paper before closing his eyes and just sketching the image he saw flashed before them. If this was right… then what Liam's mother was experimenting with was very, very bad.

He started with the completed symbol, the one that wasn't yet on Liam's back. The one Liam wore still lacked the center portion. And yet, Ed was beginning to realize that it didn't matter.

Ed could only barely sense Roy's presence beside him as he scribbled. Roy knew better than to ask Ed what he was doing when he was focused like this, and Ed was grateful for it. Even Al sometimes would forget and ask him what he as doing at the worst possible time.

When the image was complete, Ed instantly recognized what it was for. That little wealth of alchemic knowledge had been triggered and now he just had to process it for the questioning gaze of the older man.

"A transmutation circle that Karen might have been using," Ed explained.

"So Liam's is missing the outer and inner rings?"

Ed shook his head. "This outer ring is ancient. Even Shou Tucker was just getting the faintest idea of its potential. The symbol that Tucker used is inside of this ring. Tucker used identical symbols on the human and the animal he would combine. They would become a fifty-fifty blend. The results of the blend were unpredictable, though."

"And this…?" Roy asked quietly.

"Uses only one of Tucker's symbols. It is divided between or among the animals and humans to be used in the chimera." Ed tried to keep his voice steady for Roy's sake. "The parts of the symbol dictate what parts will be dominant in the chimera. For example, you could decide to make a cat who can fly by only having the wings dominant in the chimera by putting that part of the symbol on the bird and then the rest of it on the cat."

"But transmutation circles need to be complete," Roy said. "You have to have a complete circle for them to activate."

"Which is what the outer circle does." Ed paused and redrew just the outer circle with chalk on the floor. He thought this might work with another transmutation symbol, and so he got two pieces of paper and drew one that Roy was familiar with, the fire alchemy symbol. He split it up randomly on two pieces of paper. He did not even do it so neatly as to divide it in halves. Some of the pieces were even out of order.

Putting his fingers to the ancient circle he'd drawn, the two pieces of paper smoldered. It didn't work quite the same as it would have if the transmutation circle had been drawn the traditional way, but Ed could tell that Roy got the idea. Roy looked genuinely terrified and as his hand reached out for what Ed had sketched for the chimera transmutation, it visibly shook.

"We can fix this," Ed said. "We can get the circle off of Liam and we will try to find out just what Karen is up to." He rested his hand over Roy's trembling one and made the older man drop the paper.

"I never should have left him with her," Roy said, his eyes focused on the paper.

"Did you ever think her capable of something like this?" Roy shook his head. "Well, then you can't blame yourself for leaving a kid with his mother." Without even thinking about it, Ed pulled him close and held him. Roy didn't seem to have the energy to protest. "Besides, this is the worst case scenario. We can't know for sure this is what she was doing. Not yet."

"It doesn't matter if it is or not," Roy said. "She hurt him to do this. You said so yourself. She did this to a little boy, and I was here oblivious to it all. I've never really done right by him."

Ed sighed. Over the last few days, he had considered throwing the same argument in Roy's face. Had Roy always done everything that he could have for the boy? Ed couldn't say, but he could guess that circumstances had a lot to do with the decisions Roy had made.

"What would you have done differently?" Ed asked.

There was a long pause. "A lot of things." Ed could feel Roy turn his head toward him, and a tiny part of the younger man's mind told him that Roy's statement had been for him in a small way. Ed ran a hand through Roy's hair as he held him. It was a subconscious gesture on his part. "I messed up so much and he's paying for it."

Ed didn't know what to say, but he held Roy as he knew the man was crying. He suspected that Roy hadn't really let it all out prior to this moment, and it was left to Ed to pull him together. The vindictive part of his mind wanted to tell Roy to stop. He wanted to tell him he was a horrible parent, that everything he'd brought upon his son was his fault. Yet, he couldn't bring himself to do it.

He held Roy as they sat on the floor and he let the man cry against his shoulder. Roy had been strong for Ed in the past. Ed could do the same for Roy, even if they were no longer together.

_"I don't know why we have to share a tent," Ed said as he unpacked his cot and set it up inside the large tent. "I used to be able to have a small pup tent to myself. That's all I ask for." Ed looked at the cot and clapped his hands, which transformed it into something that more closely resembled a bed._

_"You're not just a state alchemist this time," __Roy__ said. "You're also a lieutenant colonel."_

_"Yeah? So now that I'm a high-ranking officer, I have to _share_ a tent instead of get one to myself? And with you?"_

_Roy__ drew a transmutation circle on his bed to transform it as Ed had done with a clap of his hands. "I don't snore, and I promise you that your innocence is safe with me." __Roy__ smirked at him as he changed into his boxers and a t-shirt._

_"Who said I still had it?" Ed asked with a smirk of his own as he settled into bed, already changed into his boxers and t-shirt. He caught the look of surprise on __Roy__'s face, and there was a definite pondering on the part of the older man, as though he was trying to determine who it had been. "You wouldn't know him."_

_Unfortunately, Ed realized with that statement, he had revealed a bit more about himself than he'd intended. To his relief, there was no remark, no look of shock from the older man. Though he remained reluctant about sharing the tent with his commanding officer, afraid of what the night could bring, would most likely bring, Ed decided that sleep was far better than possibly putting his foot in his mouth any further._

_Like most nights, that sleep was troubled by his past. Tonight, it was the death of his mother—surprisingly, not one of the most prominent nightmares he suffered, but one that usually left him whimpering in his sleep like the child he'd been when it had happened. To Ed's surprise, he felt arms wrapped around him and a hand at his hair as he awoke. He looked up to the uncovered coal black eye, afraid to see judgment there._

_To his shock, __Roy__ just smiled, not letting Ed go. "I wondered whose nightmares would wake us up first. Good thing I didn't lay bets on it, because I'd have said it would have been mine."_

_0o0o0o0  
_

Roy didn't even realize he'd fallen asleep until he heard the sound of footsteps entering the room, followed by tiny sniffles.

"Daddy…" the voice said, pathetically.

Roy cracked open his eye and saw his son looking at him, looking lost and very confused. And why wouldn't he? Roy wasn't asleep in his bed. He was asleep on the floor of the library while using his ex-boyfriend as his pillow.

"Dad… I…" the boy looked very embarrassed, particularly as he saw Ed rallying beside Roy. "I had an accident." Roy knew that for a boy his age, especially one who'd never had a problem with bedwetting, this was just shy of humiliating to admit to his father, let alone with Ed there as well.

"It's okay, Liam," Roy said, moving from the floor, his entire body stiff. "Come on, let's get you cleaned up."

"I'll take care of the bed," Ed said quietly, so that only Roy, who was close enough, heard him. Roy wanted to argue, but decided it was best to spare his son further embarrassment as he stood and led Liam into the downstairs bathroom. He passed by Ed's namesake in the hall, who was giving him an almost accusatory glare as he guided Liam into the bathroom.

"Were you having a sleep over with Ed?" Liam asked, innocently as Roy got a washcloth ready with warm water and some soap.

"Something like that," Roy said. "Ed's going to help get that mark off your back. He knows how to do it."

"Will it hurt like it did to get it?" There was genuine fear in Liam's eyes. The kind of fear Roy would expect if the torturous experience was exactly as Ed had said.

"Ed said we can put you to sleep," Roy said. "And then you won't feel anything."

"Good," Liam said with a relieved smile as he pulled down the wet pajama pants and handed them to Roy. He then took off the shirt, and Roy had to wince as he saw the large dark circle on his back, particularly now that he knew it didn't necessarily have to be completed.

"Do you want to tell me about your nightmare?"

"N-not really," Liam said, taking the washcloth from his father and wiping down his legs.

"It could help to talk about it," Roy said. "Was it about when your mother gave you that?" He touched his hand over the dark brown marking. It never failed to surprise him that it was as smooth as the skin elsewhere on the boy's back. He expected it to be raised or indented somehow.

"No," Liam said after he finished wiping off. Roy grabbed one of his under shirts that he kept stored in the little closet and pulled it over Liam's head. Now that his son was living here, he was going to have to keep some of the boy's clothes down here too.

"Something else you saw at your mother's house?" Roy asked, receiving a small nod in reply. He ran some water in the sink and let the pajamas soak in it.

"Please don't make me talk about it," Liam said, his body shaking.

"We don't have to right now," Roy said. He rung out the pajamas and then dried his hands before bending down to pick up his son and hold him close. "For now, let's see if you can get some sleep."

"Can I sleep in the big bed with you?"

Roy kissed his son's temple as he carried him from the bathroom. "If you want to." Limbs that were just a little too long to be held anymore tried to hold on as father carried son up the stairs and toward Roy's bedroom.

"His bed's clean," Ed whispered as they passed.

"Thank you," Roy told the young man. "I really do appreciate that, but he wants to sleep with me tonight."

Liam turned his head to look at Ed. "You can too… It's a big bed. More comfortable than the floor."

Roy tried to convey to Ed through a look that he wouldn't mind regardless of the young man's decision. A part of him desperately wanted Ed to join them, though he knew it would only further complicate things. Somehow, comforting Roy's son by being a protective presence went far beyond what was nearly started by the kiss in the kitchen.

Ed looked between the little boy, whose brown eyes practically pleaded for the extra protection of another person, to the father who obviously seemed to be leaving this decision up to him.

"Fine," Ed said. "Anything would be better than the floor." He saw the faintest smile on Liam's face as they all headed to the master bedroom. If things had gone differently, this wouldn't seem so strange. Had Roy just told him about the boy's existence, Ed could have been a stepfather of sorts to Liam. That thought seemed very strange, as Ed hadn't even contemplated the idea of having children at any point in his life.

If things had gone differently with Roy, he would have inherited one by virtue of his lover. Then again, as far as kids went, Liam wasn't a bad one to get saddled with.

Following behind the older man, Ed pulled a face at his own thoughts. Calling being a father figure to Liam being "saddled with" the boy certainly reinforced Roy's reasoning not to tell him. It still didn't justify it, but Ed could recognize that he didn't care for his own thought processes at the moment.

Roy let Liam pick where he wanted to sleep, and the boy chose the middle, but looked to Ed to make sure it was okay with him.

"There are some pajamas that might fit you in that drawer," Roy said, pointing to the dresser. Ed nodded and opened it, surprised to find that the half of that same drawer that had been his remained empty. Roy hadn't even let his own clothing spread out. It remained tightly folded and packed into the half of the drawer that had been his. Ed grabbed a pair of pants and tossed over Roy's favorite set before heading into the bathroom to get changed.

0o0o0o0

He stripped down to his boxers and tank before pulling on the pajama bottoms. They were a bit big for him, but they would work. Stepping out of the room, Ed spotted Roy in the middle of changing. It had been a few weeks since he'd seen the man shirtless, and Ed somewhat suspected that Roy had not been eating much in the last few days. He looked like he'd lost a few pounds. Still, as he stood there, Ed took in the body and all of its scars. People liked to imagine Roy had a flawless body, but in reality, he was as scarred as Ed, except none of his were localized to a mechanical arm and leg. Being a fire alchemist had given him his fair share, as had serving in countless battles, but the most damage had been done by the fuhrer and Archer. The scar on his face was not ugly, but it was definitely there and very hard to avoid the first time a person saw it. The wound on his shoulder had never properly healed, and it left visible scarring front and back. It was a miracle that the older man had survived that night.

Ed tried to repress the stirring of old feelings, of old concern as he watched Roy pull on his clothing.

Roy was fully clothed in the green pajamas before he noticed Ed at the doorway. If he realized that Ed had been standing there all along, he didn't say so. "Are you sure you're okay with this?" Roy asked.

"The kid looked like he wouldn't mind the extra protection. Ed tossed his clothes over the rocking chair in the corner, or rather where it had been. He had forgotten he'd taken it with him to the apartment—he still couldn't call it his apartment, but it was feeling slightly like home now.

"Sorry," Ed said, going to pick it up.

"Leave it," Roy said. "Doesn't matter."

That was definitely not something Ed would have heard before, but this was a different Roy, a defeated Roy. Even if they weren't together, Ed wanted to do something about that. It wasn't good for Roy and it sure as hell wasn't good for his son.

"Get into bed," Ed told the older man. He climbed beneath the covers of the bed."We're going to need rest. And we'll get Al to help, since the cat obviously loves him and likes me well enough. Going to be hard to explain that we will have to shave him."

As though on cue, Ed the cat hopped onto the bed and settled himself at the top of the bed, above Liam's head. Then, to Ed's surprise, the boy moved toward the new warmth in the bed. Roy climbed into the bed with them, pulling Liam over toward him. The look on Roy's eyes was apologetic, as though he was saying he was sorry to Ed over his son's unconscious actions.

Ed really didn't mind. More than once he'd needed comforting growing up from troubles that soft words could help, but a hard suit of armor hugging him just couldn't make go away. Roy gathered Liam into his arms and Ed subconsciously shifted just a bit closer to the family next to him as he began to fall asleep.


	16. Pain

Ed woke slowly, as it felt a bit early for him to rise. He wasn't sure of the time just yet, but as he tried to shift to see the clock and get a good stretch in, he found something was preventing him from it. He glanced down to see a head of jet black hair pressed against his chest. Realizing now who this was, he noticed the small arms wrapped around him as Liam slept on. The other side of the bed was empty, but Ed could hear the shower running in the bathroom, which made it easy to guess where the bed's occupant had gone.

Not wanting to disturb the boy and not having to pee so bad that he'd risk seeing Roy in the shower, Ed stayed where he was. He'd need to call Al just as soon as he got up from the bed. He'd work with Al on the cat, who Ed realized was now resting above his head, its tail moving restlessly against his cheek. Then, he and Roy would work on Liam.

Of course, Ed would have to find an excuse to get Roy out of the house. He couldn't let the man see what he and Al were going to have to do for the cat, or Roy might suspect what Ed was going to do with Liam. No way in hell was he putting the nearly complete symbol on Roy's back when Liam's mother had an admitted grudge against the man. That was just stupid—not holding the grudge because Ed understood that, but for Ed to let Roy wear the whole design.

He debated leaving something small behind on Liam as an extra safeguard to what Ed already had in mind. It was a good idea, but one he knw Roy wouldn't agree to, and Ed felt he could understand why, even if he still thought it was a good idea. Nevertheless, he was sure he could come up with something. Mustang certainly had enough people loyal to him who would be willing to do it.

He looked down at the little boy, wondering how he could be so trusting after all he'd gone through. Liam was the age Ed had been when he'd begun resenting his father rather than wishing he'd return. And Ed had been blessed with a good mother, though for far too short a time. Ed knew without a doubt that if he'd gone through what Liam had, he would not be as open and friendly as the boy clinging to his tanktop would be.

Above him, Ed the cat stood and stretched, then walked from his spot above Ed's head, stepping on his forehead in the process before giving him a look that clearly said it was Ed's fault for his head being in the way. Ed's namesake then moved over to where he could headbutt Ed's hand for attention, which Ed gave the cat despite the rather rude step on his face.

The yellow cat began purring loudly, and Ed began wondering the same about the animal as he had been about the boy. Though he hadn't seen proof yet, Ed suspected the cat had the other half of the circle. He couldn't say what the combination of the two would create, but there was no doubting the boy would be blended with the animal if the two were activated.

Ed hadn't noticed the bathroom door opening, but his peripheral vision did catch Mustang smiling at the three on the bed. Ed would have said the smile was a good thing, if he hadn't noticed the sadness in the man's dark eye, if the damned patch wasn't there to serve as his armor against the world. Ed didn't like seeing Roy this vulnerable. He wanted to stay mad at him—and he still was—without feeling guilty for it. Roy had been in the wrong. Ed had given Roy opportunities to make things right, and he hadn't.

When Roy seemed to realize he was being stared at, he looked away. Ed couldn't remember a time before when the man backed down from a simple staring contest so easily, and that troubled him. He almost regretted telling the older man about the effects of the transmutation circle, but he knew that Roy needed to know the truth.

Ed focused on the man's body again, as he had last night. He was wearing only a towel and his hair was slicked back with water. Ed tried so damned hard not to focus on what he knew was beneath the piece of fabric. Apparently, all the anger and hurt in the world couldn't calm the lust over the man that had made steady ebbs and flows in Ed's psyche since he hit puberty. However, the gentle breathing of the boy at his chest could do what the anger and hurt couldn't. The last thing he needed was to look like a pervert or give the poor kid an additional trauma.

Roy pulled a pair of boxers on beneath the towel before letting it drop.

"Does the kid have school today?" Ed asked. Roy seemed surprised at the sudden break in the silence, hesitating for a moment before nodding. "Good. It will give us time to work on the cat." Ed shifted, which made the boy snuggle closer.

"If you want me to move him, I can," Roy offered, taking a step closer.

"No," Ed said, rubbing a hand over Liam's shoulders. "He's fine. He's a good kid."

"Yes," Roy said, not without a small amount of pride.

The body currently half on top of Ed's chest and stomach shifted and the sound of a small yawn could be heard, though Ed could still only see the top of the black head of hair. The head turned and hazy brown eyes looked up at Ed, who expected Liam to be startled. Instead, the boy smiled and looked around for the cat, it seemed, as he instantly relaxed when the furball nudged his hand for attention.

The bed dipped as Roy sat down next to his son. "Hey, buddy, how did you sleep?" Roy asked as he rubbed a hand over Liam's back.

"Okay," Liam said as he rolled over, but staying close to Ed. The young man had no idea what he'd done to earn such trust from the boy. "Better once I was here." He turned slightly pink as he seemed to remember last night. "I'm sorry for messing the bed."

"Nothing to be sorry for," Roy told him. "Ed got it all cleaned up right away. He used his alchemy, and you know how quick that is."

Liam grinned and looked over at Ed. "Yeah." He paused for a moment and looked over at Ed. "Elysia tried to teach me a game, Miss Mary Mack," he explained. "Sort of like Patty Cake, but a lot more to remember." He glanced down at Ed's hands. "Can you play those kinds of games? Or, would you clap and…" He made an exploding noise and made his hands grow wide with fingers outstretched as he illustrated visually.

"I can turn it on and off," Ed said with a hearty laugh. He didn't know if the boy had gotten so easily distracted or he feared questioning from the two men, but the little sidetrack was amusing.

"That's awesome!" Liam said with genuine enthusiasm. "Can you show me how sometime?"

"It's not something that can be taught," Ed said. "It's just something that some people can do. But… I can teach you some alchemy you can do whether or not you do it clapping your hands." Liam grinned at Ed, and there was no sign of the hurt in the boy's eyes that had absolutely every right to be there.

0o0o0o0

Roy stood again, but he watched the two talking alchemy for a moment before pulling on a white long-sleeved T-shirt. His mind was being cruel to him at the moment, telling him that it could have always been like this. Ed and Liam chatting away about alchemy—Liam would probably be at least as brilliant as Al, since he would never have the information from the Gate that Ed had—while Roy did his best to keep up.

All of the what-ifs and could-bes weren't going to help, and he did his best to stop his rebellious mind from thinking of it. He needed to focus on helping his son, not himself.

"Liam," Roy asked, getting the boy to turn toward him, "can you show Ed the tattoo on your back?"

The boy was hesitant, but nodded. He pulled up the oversized undershirt that Roy had dressed him in last night. Though his lower body was still tangled in the sheet and blanket, the shirt lifted to reveal the markings exactly as his son had drawn them, save for being reversed.

"You did a really good job copying that down," Ed told him, pushing the shirt back over Liam's back, which he gave a quick rub as his hand smoothed it down. "Do you know what it's for?"

Roy glared at Ed. If he had plans to explain to his son that his mother had actually intended to combine him with an animal, to make him a chimera, those plans could stop right now. Liam didn't need to know what his mother had been planning. He knew enough to know it wasn't good. He was a boy, he should have…

"Yeah," a voice said, breaking up his internal tirade. His son's voice. "I know."

"How do you know?" Ed asked. He gave Roy a look that clearly said for him to sit on the bed with them.

"Because there are others…" Liam looked over at Roy as his weight shifted them on the mattress. Ed's hand never stopped rubbing the boy's back.

"Others how, Liam?" Roy asked.

"Mom would bring people in, people who didn't have families to take care of them or sometimes a house to go to at night," Liam said. "It seemed really nice to do, and mom always said they left while I was still asleep. But… I think she lied."

"What do you mean?" Roy prodded for more information as he lightly scratched at his son's hair. Like always, Liam leaned into that touch.

"When I got the tattoo… I saw them. Some looked like they used to, but different. All in cages."

"How did they look different?" Ed asked.

"Depended," Liam held to his knees as he drew them up to his chest. " Ears, tails, weird noses, wings. Some didn't look like people, but I think they used to be." Then, teary eyes looked up at Roy. "I don't want to be like that, Daddy."

Roy wrapped his arms around his son, suddenly grateful he'd cried himself out earlier with Ed. If he hadn't, he was certain he would have now.

"I'm not going to let it happen," Roy said. "I promise you. Didn't I say that Ed's going to help get rid of the tattoo? We'll fix this. Promise."

Ed shifted closer and placed his hand at Liam's back. "We really will. Promise."

Liam nodded and gave a faint sniffle. "And Ed too? After mom did me, she did Ed. After I heard him crying, that's when I called you, Dad."

"And I'm very glad you did," Roy said, kissing his son's forehead. That fact gave him something to think about. His son hadn't contacted Roy until his pet had been hurt. He held onto Liam for a while, mulling this over before finally checking the clock and seeing it was now the normal time he would be waking his son up.

"Do you think you can manage to go to school today?" Roy asked.

The boy nodded against his father's chest. "I like school. Elysia made sure all the other kids are really nice to me. It's a lot better than it was at home."

Roy rubbed a hand over Liam's head and ignored the faint twisting in his stomach that after everything, Liam still called that place his home. "Well, then, you're going to need breakfast, aren't you? How about waffles? Homemade ones?" Liam looked up at him with a grin. "I don't hear any opposition to that, but someone's going to need to get a shower before he goes to school."

"Go on to your bathroom. I'll get the waffles started, and Ed can get the chance to get dressed while we're out of the room."

Liam gave Roy a tight hug, then turned and did the same to Ed, much to the blond's surprise. "Thank you."

"I haven't done anything yet," Ed said.

"But you're trying," Liam answered as he let him go. He slid off the bed and headed to the door, looking back at Roy just once before heading down the hall. Despite the tear trails on his cheeks, he looked happier, lighter than he had since Roy rescued him from his "home." The orange-yellow ball of fluff followed him with a graceful leap from the bed.

He looked back at Ed, wearing a tank top and Roy's pajama bottoms, his hair mussed from sleep, but eyes wide awake. "Well, that turned up a few things I hadn't expected," he said. "Look, Al and I will handle the cat. I'll give him a call. I know he'll help. I need you to check into disappearances in the town where Liam's from, as well as check out the stray animal population. Then, get in touch with Melissa Rosenberg. I know you trust her, and she can help us to keep Liam unconscious and monitoring him when we do this. Al knows enough about animals to do so for the other Ed."

Roy nodded. "Are you sure? Should I be there to know what's going to happen with Liam?"

"I think it's better to know what Karen's been doing and have everything ready to get rid of the tattoo tonight," Ed said. "The sooner it's off of him, the better."

"Absolutely," Roy said. "I just question how long it will be until Karen makes her move." The younger man looked up at him with a curious expression. "I no more believe she's really done with this than you do. She wanted something by doing this to Liam. If she already had a steady supply of lonely and homeless people and stray animals, why go after Liam? And why the cat _after_ him? Don't get me wrong, I know she hated Ed. I'm not surprised he would be part of the experiments, but I would have thought she would have done him first."

Ed didn't look like this was a shock to him. "If you think this is all part of some bigger plan, then why are you willing to take the tattoo onto yourself?"

"Because Liam is my son and my responsibility."

Ed nodded, and didn't argue, to the older man's surprise.

0o0o0o0

Roy was already gone with Liam, going back to the office to investigate. Al had come over to the house simply on the request from his brother. Ed felt the familiar twinge of guilt for how he'd lied about his brother and yet how easy it was for Al to just come to his side when he needed him. Ed knew he couldn't keep this up for much longer. Al was old enough now that Ed couldn't just continue to protect him.

He and Al had gone over Ed's notes a few times before finally luring out the blond's namesake with a can of tuna.

Shortly after the cat rubbed against Ed's legs like he was the greatest person in the world, they had managed to knock the cat unconscious with some chloroform that they'd made with alchemy. With it asleep, they proceeded to shave around the cat's belly.

"Hard to believe this is the one that you rescued those years ago," Ed said as he carefully ran the razor over the thick white fur of the cat's stomach. It wasn't easy work, as he was afraid he would knick the animal with the blades. He was grateful that Liam had told him where to look on the animal's body. The inner circle of the array was there just as the boy had predicted.

Now, they sat with the cat on the guest bed, still out cold.

"Al… I hate to ask this of you, because it's going to hurt. A lot…"

"You need me here to take the circle, don't you?" Al asked.

"Well, that or for you to put it on me," Ed said. "I'm not going to put a circle on another animal, since an animal can't tell me yes or no or to stop. And I'm not transferring the whole thing, either."

"So all of that with the notes, that was to placate me? Make me feel like you cared about my opinion?"

"What? No. Hell no. I don't want to screw things up with the cat, and definitely not with the kid. I needed your opinion because you're a damned good alchemist." Al looked shocked.

"Then why did you write what you did in my file?" Al asked, drawing out the transmutation circle they would need to transfer the tattoos.

"Because you are a brilliant alchemist, you retained all that knowledge in that head of yours without the divine intervention of the Gate, but you aren't a killer," Ed said. "Because you were fifteen and blind to the other options available to you and to the fact that Winry was more than a little interested in you."

"I spoke to Brigadier General Noolan…" Al said, putting the finishing touch on the circle. Ed tried not to glare at his brother. "He approached me, not the other way around. He said he thought you'd lied on my files. You did, then?"

"I did, to an extent. I blamed your alchemy for why you'd make an inferior soldier because the military would be certain they could correct your morals to make you see their way." Ed gently laid the cat in the circle. "I don't think they could, but if they did, you wouldn't be you anymore." There was silence for a few moments, and Ed hoped that his confession wouldn't make his brother resent him for making this decision for him.

Al looked over at him. "You need to be with it enough to help Liam. You put the circle on me, and if I need to rest it off, I'll do it here."

Ed nodded. "Does that mean you're not mad at me?"

"I wouldn't say that," Al said. "That wasn't a call for you to make. I need time to think about this." He gave a defeated chuckle. "At least you put it nicer than Roy did. He was very blunt as he lectured me."

It was Ed's turn to look surprised. "Roy lectured you?"

"He found Noolan talking to me," Al said. "He told Noolan off and then he did to me."

The older brother found himself smiling as he heard his brother describe what Roy had said. After Al finished and the transmutation was ready to go, the younger man gaped.

"You've fallen for him again."

"No again about it," Ed said, his smile turning sad. "I'd have had to have fallen out in the first place to do it again. And don't lecture me on it, Al. If I could change that fact…" If he was perfectly honest, even if he could change what he felt for Roy, he probably wouldn't. With a sigh, he looked down at the circle and then back at his brother. "Well, there's no more stalling this."

"Nope," Al said, taking off his shirt and stretching his upper body across the circle on the sheets.

"You know how this will hurt, don't you?" Ed asked. "Because I always can do it instead."

"I know what I'm getting into. And I'm still here." He glanced over at Ed as he rested on the bed. "Try to at least make it look cool. I don't have fur to cover it up."

"Will do." Ed clapped his hands together. "And Al… I'm sorry."

He pressed his hands to the circle and his brother screamed.

0o0o0o0

The moment they were in the door, Liam was calling out for his cat, who promptly came running down the stairs, looking more than a little put out at the lack of fur on his stomach. The boy bent down and looked at the cat's belly. "Some of the tattoo is still there," he said as he held Ed the cat in his arms.

"We figured it was safer that way," Ed, the human one, said as he came down the stairs. "Once the fur grows over, no one would know what symbols are there, and duplicating the symbols is too risky. Any alchemist would know it. So they'd have to shave him like we did, see what's there." Roy felt as though there was still something that Ed wasn't saying. He looked far too pale, as though he might vomit at any moment.

Melissa, who was at his side, seemed to think so as well. She walked over to Ed and asked him a few questions while Roy got Liam to change into his pajama bottoms. Liam was so excited and so trusting that he would actually manage to be free of the tattoo that it took no time for the energetic little boy got his clothes off and pajamas on.

"You didn't eat anything at school?" Roy asked.

Liam shook his head. "Nope. Dr. Rosenberg said it would make me sick with the medicine to make me go to sleep." Liam turned around, thankfully, facing that awful marking away from Roy. "I really don't have to be awake for this? So it won't hurt?"

Roy nodded. "That's what Ed said."

The boy beamed up at his father as he grabbed his hand. "Let's go then."

He ran down the stairs and found a very concerned Melissa looking down at Ed. Apparently, in their talk, he'd explained a little bit of what the tattoo would do. Yet, she seemed worried about Ed as much as she was about Liam and Roy. The older man knew just by the atmosphere in the room that there was no way he was going to get any answers at the moment. He just questioned how much of it was Liam's presence and how much of it was him.

Ed had already drawn the symbol on the floor, which, Roy noted was considerably softer than before.

"For Liam's sake," Ed explained. "He's going to be sleeping on it. It wasn't hard to change the floor, and I can always change it back." His voice seemed strange, raspy and as Roy got closer, his eyes looked red.

He mouthed to ask how Ed the cat was, and Ed confirmed the cat was okay. Roy just couldn't figure out what was affecting Ed like this.

Melissa moved close, seated on a low chair so that she could stand back up again. "Will you be okay sitting in that chair all this time?"

"I can manage," she said, rubbing her hand over the very noticeable bump. Roy knew there was something entirely wrong with the world that an ex-girlfriend was six months pregnant, dating a person like a sister to him, and helping him with his own child. If he believed in some higher being, Roy was certain that said deity would have one hell of a sadistic sense of humor.

"Is the baby kicking?" Liam asked as he knelt on the floor in front of the doctor.

She nodded and took his hand to place it on her stomach while Liam looked in wonder at the bump beneath his hand.

"Shirt off," Ed told Roy. In a different situation, before everything went to hell, Roy might have made a joke at the order, but not today. Instead, he obeyed, taking off the long-sleeved shirt he'd worn—he had taken the day off of work and already had the day off tomorrow, so he was not in uniform. He felt Ed's eyes on him again, Melissa's as well. Liam was still too fascinated by the baby to pay attention. There was a difference in their gazes. Melissa had not seen the extent of the scarring on his body. Certainly, she hadn't since he defeated the fuhrer. However, she was a doctor and was very professional as her eyes took in the damage that had been done over the years to his chest, back and most of all, his shoulder. Ed's gaze was not harsh, not pitying. He knew the scars. He had mapped out the marks with his eyes, fingers and lips before.

"Liam, it's time for Dr. Rosenberg to put you to sleep for a bit," Ed said. The little dark head nodded and Melissa slowly began to administer the anesthesia. While she was carefully doing that, Ed guided Roy to lay on his stomach on the soft floor. Roy wasn't sure what the teen had done to it, but it felt more like they were sleeping on foam than carpeting over wood.

"If you tell me to stop, I will stop," Ed said.

"I won't—"

Ed cut him off. "You might. You have no idea how this is going to feel. This isn't being done at small intervals. This is being done all at once. And it's going to hurt like hell."

"I'm going to do it anyway," Roy replied.

"I thought as much." Ed ran his automail hand down Roy's arm. "Lay face down. I'll get Liam into position. He's nearly out as it is."

"Be careful with him."

"Of course," Ed said, affecting the slightest tone as though he was hurt Roy might accuse him of being anything but careful.

Roy folded his arms and turned his head so that he could watch as Ed carefully turned the boy into a similar position to the one he was in. Ed was nothing if not gentle with Liam as he placed him on the circle drawn on the floor. Roy thought he saw something blue peeking out of Liam's ears as he was put into place like a limp marionette.

Earplugs. So that his son wouldn't hear him scream and wake up prematurely.

And suddenly, Roy had to wonder where Al was, what had happened with the cat, and how Ed was so certain Roy would scream despite a high tolerance for pain.

When Ed clapped his hands and muttered an apology, Roy understood. The moment Ed's hands and arms connected the gap between father and son, he understood.

He buried his face in his arms, biting down far harder than he should have as it felt as though Ed was alternating from shocking his back to setting it aflame. The coppery taste of blood in his mouth told him that he'd broken the skin, but even the pain now in his arm was not enough to distract as each symbol felt to be etched into his skin, into his body. He never grew accustomed to the pain, as each new symbol brought with it new pain, and he screamed. He cried and yelled, but never told Ed to stop. He would not tell Ed to stop and leave the markings on his son's back.

Roy had felt pain before, been burned, been shocked, been stabbed, and this was as though all were combined, moving in a circular pattern around his back. He could not voice the words to tell Ed to stop what he was doing, so his body took the only recourse that it had left.

He passed out.


	17. Assumptions

When Roy finally woke up that morning, he could smell pancakes cooking, along with some sausage, and he heard the sounds of voices. He registered one as Liam, then a woman and a man as well. He fought the sleep that felt somewhat unnatural. He wondered if, after he passed out, he had been drugged. He slowly fought the heavy sleep as he was able to distinguish the sound of Liam's voice along with that of a man and a woman—both familiar, but in this state, he couldn't be certain.

He tried to get up, only to realize that he was pinned down. Roy was half on his side with his left leg wrapped around someone's hip, it felt, while their leg was between Roy's, curling tightly over his right leg. A heavy arm and shoulder curled over Roy's torso and warm breath steadily hit his own bare shoulder. Hair tickled beneath Roy's chin, and he registered that the arm and shoulder he was feeling were not flesh and blood.

Roy opened his eyes fully to look down at the golden hair of his sleeping partner and the young man's own shirtless state.

Sluggishly, he tried to move, but his arm felt heavy, despite the fact that it wasn't being held in a death grip by Ed at the moment. However, the younger man seemed to feel the movement and Roy heard the distinctive little grunts and moans that signaled that Ed was waking up.

With a loud groan, Ed pulled himself from Roy. "Shit…" he said slowly as he tried to shift. It didn't sound like a complaint about how they had woke up, but rather one of pain and ache, much like Roy was beginning to feel throughout his entire back and shoulders.

"I agree," Roy said. "But why are you complaining?" After all, Ed wasn't the one who had gotten the tattoo, and he wasn't the one whose arm was throbbing in pain from being bitten the night before.

Ed looked at Roy with weary eyes and sat up to face him, looking like it was killing him to do so.

"Ed… what did you…?"

Ed shrugged with a wince at the movement and stood, very slowly, running a hand over his hair as though to straighten it. He then pulled out the braid and shook his long hair loose. Roy loved the hair that now went nearly to the teen's waist, but he kept his thoughts to himself as he watched the young man roll his shoulders and neck.

"How are you feeling?" he asked the older man.

"Like someone ran over me with a car," Roy replied as he attempted to sit up. He was now immensely grateful that Ed had transformed the floor of the living room into something much more comfortable.

"Well, darn, you caught me," Ed said as he looked down at Roy. "I needed a way to get revenge, so I hauled your ass outside after you passed out and practiced my driving over top of you."

Ed held out a hand to him, and as Roy reached up to take his former lover's hand, he noted the bandages on his arm. He suddenly remembered being in so much pain that he'd bit down until he'd broken the flesh.

"I'm sorry," Ed said. "Al threw up when the pain got too bad for him, started choking, so I couldn't be sure what would happen to you. Guess I should have given you something other than your arm." He gave a tired smile as his hand remained outstretched.

"Is there a reason your shirt is off?" Roy asked. "And what do you mean about Al?"

"We'll start with Al," Ed said, lowering the hand and looking down at Roy. "I needed to transfer Ed's tattoo to someone. Al was willing to take part of it."

"That's why you looked so sick when I came in," Roy said.

"Well, yeah, mostly. It isn't every day a person is asked to torture people he cares about, you know?" Roy looked at Ed's eyes, sad and older than they were before, but a part of him hoped that the way Ed had phrased that had been intentional, that he was telling Roy he cared about him. "Besides, those tattoos hurt like hell." He pulled at the top of his pants and showed Roy something that looked like a circle at his right hip.

"You took…"

"Part of my namesake's tattoo. Just in case." He held out his hand to Roy again. "Come on, I smell food and I think Melissa's making breakfast. She's a really awesome woman. Riza should be glad that you're such an idiot when it comes to your relationships."

Roy knew _that_ particular phrase had been intentional, even if the other wasn't. He took the hand offered and stood, feeling uncertain on his feet with the soft surface beneath.

"Don't be a baby about it," Ed told him. "What happened to the man who all but swore he had the pain tolerance to deal with this?"

"He took a little more of the tattoo than your little circle there," Roy said with a frown as he stood. "I'd like to check a mirror first."

"Are you honestly that vain? You know what it looks like. Let it drop."

Roy raised an eyebrow. Despite his still groggy state, he could sense something suspicious in the other alchemist's behavior. He took a few steps forward, hearing a resigned sigh from behind him, as though Ed was already giving up on stopping him. Yes, there was definitely something wrong, more than just the break up or the way they had woke up holding one another.

He glanced back at Ed and realized now why the younger man hadn't wanted him to look in the mirror. The blond was knelt down on the floor, transmuting the soft surface back to carpeting and wood. As the transmutation took place, the blast of energy blew the long blond hair from his back. And that was when Roy saw them. Nearly every piece of the transmutation circle, except for the lettering, decorated the teen's back. Roy couldn't believe that he had passed out with only so little done to himself, while Ed had managed to do that to himself.

Then, as the feelings of inferiority to Ed's pain tolerance faded, his anger grew.

"You were told to transfer the whole circle onto me," Roy snapped.

"Yeah, well, that wasn't going to happen once you fainted," Ed said as he stood. "I wasn't going to keep torturing an unconscious man. Besides, it's off the kid this way."

"That wasn't the point," the older man growled. "This isn't your responsibility."

"You didn't mind when I had the cat's tattoo on me. What's so different about this?" Ed asked blandly, putting his arms across his chest defensively.

"I did mind. I mind because what has happened to my son and to that damned cat is my burden to take on. It's my risk to take, not yours."

"Yeah, so that the next time you run into your lovely ex, she can blend you with an animal and make a nice little Mustang chimera," Ed said. "I never had any intention of risking it. I'd have knocked you out if you hadn't done it on your own." Roy opened his mouth to argue, but was cut off. "You are all your son has, aside from a psychopathic bitch of a mother."

"And you think she only holds a grudge against me?" Roy hissed, trying not to let his voice carry so that his son would hear. "You denied her the right to study her projects as much as I did. Her loathing for you is only overshadowed by how much she hates me."

"So, you're allowed to protect me from her, but not the other way around?" Ed had managed to keep his tone surprisingly cool, even as Roy quietly raged at him.

"Yes," Roy said, pointing his finger in the young man's face. "I'm grateful to have Liam, but she was my mistake."

"Yeah, and a long time ago, we both more or less accepted to start helping one another with our mistakes."

"After the way things ended, I seriously doubt that still applies," Roy answered.

"We've been covering one another's asses long before we started dating, Roy," Ed said. "Back when we were only friends, we did. I don't see why things should change now." And with that, the blond walked by the older man.

"How are you still thinking so straight?" The older man asked, as his own emotions and mind seemed to be lost in the fog from the drugs. "I know you said I passed out, but I feel drugged. So why don't you seem bothered by it?"

"I let Melissa do that while I was treating your arm." Ed looked down the bandage a moment before meeting Roy's eye again. "And I'm not bothered by the drugs because I wasn't given any. The pain's worse, but comparable to getting automail installed. I didn't pass out like you or Al."

He may not have passed out, but he certainly looked exhausted and in as much aching pain as Roy, himself, was. The older man knew Ed's tells well enough by now. The way his body seemed to struggle to hold the weight of his automail. That was always a sign of pain and exhaustion in the younger man, even when he was trying very hard not to show it. Before, Roy would have offered the young man a massage, or just gone up behind him to rub his shoulders. He thought that, as a gesture of gratitude, if nothing else, he might have done so by now despite all that had happened between them, but Roy had to admit he was still too sore to do much of anything, let alone do anything more than idly move his hands around on Ed's shoulders.

Breakfast was a strange affair, as the three men all tried in one breath to let the pregnant woman sit down and in the next let her treat them for their aches and pains. "Just sit down, all of you," she said. "Stop being so stubborn. My life would be so much simpler without dealing with Elrics and Mustangs."

"Can I help you?" Liam asked. "I'm not officially a Mustang yet."

"Of course you can," Melissa told the boy, ruffling his hair. "Can you help clear the plates? But just take them one or two at a time." Liam nodded and eagerly helped her. He seemed very pleased that he was finally free of the damned tattoo, and Ed was glad. He might not be able to get rid of the memories of what he went through, but he could at least eliminate the daily reminder.

Ed watched as the boy cleared his dishes, and he quite honestly didn't have the energy to try to tell him that he was more than capable of clearing them for himself.

Melissa was busy checking Roy's back, having already done so to Al and Ed when Liam looked up at Ed, the blond's glass in his hands. "Ed?" he asked, making the younger man look down at the lightly freckled face.

"Hmm?" he asked, surprised to find he didn't even seem to have the energy for a proper response or even an actual word.

"I know you hurt today, but… if you didn't, I think I'd have to hug you." Those brown eyes, so different from Roy's coal black, twitched as they scanned his face. Ed managed to find the effort to smile and to pat the boy's arm. He received a smile in return.

"I appreciate the thought. And maybe later, I'll take you up on that."

Ed caught Roy looking at them, and he couldn't help but miss the almost wistful expression on the older man's face. As gold eyes met black, Ed was practically shouting his thoughts that if Roy wanted to see this so much, he should have trusted him. It seemed that the man got the message because he turned away quickly to look down at the tablecloth.

"Well, the only thing that I can recommend for the three of you is plenty of rest and that you call me if anything changes," Melissa said. "I want to see all four of you at the end of the week to see how you are doing." Three heads bobbed up and then down. "It's time for someone to get ready for school. The bus should be coming any time now."

Liam, who was already dressed, nodded and went to grab his bookbag, coat and shoes.

"You're a natural mother," Roy told her.

"Let's hope so," she replied as she rested her hand on her stomach. Ed had noticed her doing that quite a bit, particularly when Liam would talk about how things had been with his mother. There were times over the night, as she helped Ed deal with Roy and check on Al, Ed questioned just what it was that had made Roy dump her.

_"We just didn't work," she said quietly as she gave Al some medicine that would let him sleep. The blond looked up at her in surprise. "I can tell. You've been watching me all night with this… look."_

_"I thought maybe it was because you were, you know, more interested in women." His voice was hoarse from screaming over the night, and his speech was slurred with his need for sleep that he wouldn't allow to come until everyone else had been sorted._

_"No," Melissa said. "__Roy__ is at once an easy man to love and a very difficult man to love." Ed rolled his eyes, despite the fact that it hurt to do so. He knew that about the man all too well. "For all of his confidence and smug attitude, he is not a very confident man. He holds very strongly in the Xingian beliefs in karma, and I think he feels he only deserves very bad karma for what he's done in the past."_

_"Yeah, as though losing an eye and having limited range of movement in his shoulder isn't that," Ed scoffed._

_"He's only smug when he isn't happy, if you will notice," she said. "Riza pointed it out to me. The worse things go in his personal life, the more that he feels the world is in order and he can be at peace. He gets unsettled, nervous when things go right for him."_

_"Like he expects them to be taken away," Ed said with a faint nod. He'd noticed that._

_"Imagine how he'd react to falling in love," she said. "I imagine he'd be distant and try not to get himself invested emotionally. He'd be waiting and watching for the moment when it all fell apart, just as he knew it would. A self-fulfilling prophecy."_

It had given Ed something to think about. It didn't make what Roy had done right, but it was some food for thought. A part of Ed wanted to be vindictive and let Roy have his self-fulfilling prophecy, but there was yet another part of him that wanted to prove him wrong. He could show Roy that the age difference, the fact that he had a damaged eye, that he had a son, none of that mattered to Ed.

And truly, it didn't.

What mattered were the lying and the fact that Roy was so terrified to invest himself in their relationship. Those were Ed's stumbling blocks when it came to what he and Roy had, and he honestly wasn't sure he could get past them. He did love the man. Like Melissa had said, that was a remarkably easy thing to do, but staying with him and forcing the man to lower his defenses… Ed had faced certain death, homunculi and battle, but this seemed the most daunting task he'd ever come across.

A voice, that sounded annoyingly like Al, in the back of his mind asked him if he thought it was worth it.

As he watched the boy head out for school and both Ed and Al prepared to leave to recover at the apartment, Ed still didn't know that he had an answer to that question.

"I'm sure that Jean will be worried about you, spending two nights in a row here," Roy said.

"Maybe. He's a good enough friend to do that," Ed said. He knew that whether or not it was worth it, the lies on his end of things at least needed to stop. "Good enough of a friend to let his boss assume the wrong things about both of us because he wanted to protect me and irritate the hell out of said boss."

Roy stared at him blankly as Ed put on his coat. "You two aren't…"

"I'm not a slut and Jean plays for the wrong team for that to happen," Ed's raspy voice snapped.

"I didn't mean to suggest—"

"I don't care what you meant to do," Ed said, anger dissipating and fading. "I'll see you at work tomorrow, I guess."

Roy nodded numbly as he watched Ed leave, waiting on the porch just to be away from him. He saw the younger brother, still in the foyer of the house, seated on the bench and tying his shoes.

"I really didn't mean it that way."

"Unfortunately, Roy," Al said as he tied his shoes not far from where they stood. "That's exactly what you did. You are very good at making assumptions. Like, for instance, that I still have any desire to be a state alchemist. I have a life in Risembool now, and while I'm upset that you and my brother made that decision for me instead of leaving me to do it, I'm happy with my life as it was."

"You were talking to Noolan."

Al sighed as he stood. "Noolan was talking to me. He cornered me and has been trying to get me to talk with him for months. He's been sending so many letters out, Winry doesn't know what to do with them all."

He walked to the front door, pausing as his hand gripped the knob. "You also assume that this thing between you and Ed isn't repairable. I believe it is. With some work on your part. If you can manage to treat him a little better, I might even give my blessing for it because I want my brother happy. He deserves it, and you might too if you can redeem yourself to him."

And with that, Al was gone, walking down the front sidewalk with Ed and Roy continued to watch from the window even after they turned a corner and vanished from his view.


	18. Attempting to Heal

**Chapter 18**

The next week progressed without much to comment on. The soreness from the tattooing had faded over the first 24 hours, and he was back at work, apparently the only member of his team not affected by some flu. Everyone over the last few days had been calling in sick for a day or two, then coming back in telling him he should be grateful he hadn't caught the stomach bug they had suffered over the last day. He wondered if the tattoo process had strengthened rather than weakened his immune system because everyone seemed to be catching it but him and Ed.

Riza was out today, but Havoc was back, looking positively chipper.

"Did you see Melissa's nursing staff? I mean, I know the good doctor is spoken for, but… if I have to get sick again, I'm going to her. I wonder if being a lesbian makes for picking hotter nurses? Because there was this one, she asked about you, apparently you dated then dumped her—which makes you an idiot because she was hot."

"Does this rant have any point?" Roy asked, tiredly. "Or are you just trying to re-instate your masculinity and convince me once and for all that you are not nor have you ever been interested in other men in a sexual sense?"

Havoc didn't look affronted by Roy's line of questioning. Instead, he just smirked and placed a substantial stack of papers on his desk. "You know, you deserve a lot more than listening to me for actually thinking that I was interested in Ed that way."

"He is an attractive young man," Roy said.

"Yeah, maybe," Havoc said. "If you swing that way. _Which I don't_. Though… I do wonder. You dated Riza and Melissa, and now they're dating one another. I wonder if dating you will make Ed swing the other way."

Roy let out a groan. "I have dated other women, even men that are still very much interested in men."

"Well, good for them," Havoc said. "But it would have explained why I had so much trouble with the women you dated. Women you knew I was trying to date because you were always stealing them from me." The man looked at Roy. "Really, I am curious how you can be in the military this long and not figure out that I am straight."

"I'm sorry," Roy apologized for the twentieth time that week. Havoc had been harassing him since Ed had told Roy the truth. "Are you certain you can't catch that flu bug again and leave me alone? Or perhaps I can catch it and get away from you."

"If you haven't caught it now, no such luck," he said. "You must just be immune to it. Lucky bastard."

Ed looked over at Al as they sat in Melissa's waiting room. "Are you okay?" Ed asked his brother. Things had gotten increasingly awkward between them over the last few days, and it happened just as Ed thought things might be getting better.

"I'm fine," Al said as he leaned back and slumped down in his chair with a faint sigh. "I just realized you were right, and apparently, I have a tiny bit more pride than I thought."

"Right? About what?" Ed asked as he turned to look at the younger sibling. "About alchemical theory? About you and Winry being perfect for one another? About that toast at breakfast being much too burnt?" He smiled at Al.

"None of those actually," Al said. "But while we're at it: We'll see, Yes, but I knew that already, and yes."

"Then what?" Ed asked, though he had a suspicion. This wasn't going to be easy for his brother to admit, if Ed was also right about what he thought the topic was.

"I couldn't do it," Al said. "I couldn't be a state alchemist, even if it wasn't for having another job, or Winry, or any of that. What you've done over the last few days… I could never do it." Al let out a huff. "You know I can't do it. I've proven that."

"So what?" Ed asked. "I prefer that you can't. It isn't easy having to do something that hurts another person, and if I'm the type of person who _can_ do it, I'd rather have a brother who is the type of person who can't."

Al smiled and looked prepared to argue in his brother's defense, but a nurse called him to the back.

"Go on. Make sure I haven't done anything too destructive to you," Ed told him. He gave his brother a light shove and waited for his own turn to see the good doctor.

When the bell at the door rang, bringing two figures with the sound, Ed regretted putting Al's name down first on the sign-in sheet. The smaller of the two immediately broke out into a run, launching himself at Ed and giving him the hug he'd promised a week ago.

With a smile, despite who was with the boy, Ed returned the embrace. It was unbelievably easy to like this kid, love him even.

"Hey, Liam," Ed said. "How are you feeling?"

"Great," the boy answered, and he looked it. His eyes were bright and alive now that he wasn't marked for some sick experiment his mother was going to perform on him. This was how a kid was supposed to look, not like a miniaturized version of his father who had seen far too much in his life. "Elysia and me are going to the park after the doctor's check-up."

"Elysia and I," Roy and Ed corrected in unison. It was followed by an awkward laugh from them both.

"Elysia and _I _are going to the park," Liam repeated. "Are you here for a check-up, Ed?"

Ed gave a short nod. "Melissa wants to see all of us."

Liam nodded. "Where's Al?" he asked.

"He's already back with the doctor," Ed told him.

"Dad," Liam said. "They've got a race track. Can I play with it while we wait?"

Roy gave a single nod. "Go on. You're fine here." Liam checked the door once and then went over to the small race track on a table in the far corner of the room.

"He looks much better," Ed said.

"Thanks to you," Roy said. He looked at Liam, racing a car along the wooden track. "Why did you help him? At least, why did you put yourself through so much?"

"Because it wasn't fair to the kid," Ed said, not wanting to admit he had done so much partly because of who Liam belonged to. "Why didn't you ever tell me about him?"

Roy looked at him in slight surprise.

"What? You're allowed to ask a loaded question and I'm not?"

"This isn't really the place," Roy said, looking like a cornered animal at the moment.

"We're alone, you, me and the kid. The nurses are at their station with the secretary, behind glass. Why didn't you tell me about him?" Ed kept his tone even and low, partly so he wouldn't be heard and partly because he wanted this answer too badly to let Roy get scared out of giving it.

"When you were a kid, you weren't responsible enough to know," Roy said.

"I'll give you that, but why not later?"

"That's a second question," Roy said.

"No, it's asking for you to give the actual answer to the first." Ed knew that was a bit hypocritical to ask of Roy, since he hadn't given the full answer to the older man's question.

"Later, we were friends, and none of my team were actually told by me. I didn't know how to broach the subject, honestly. I never had to before."

"And when we were dating?"

Roy was silent for a while. "When we were dating, I knew it was already too late to tell you. Because by then, I should have already and I hadn't."

"You know, Melissa has a theory about you," Ed began, hoping this didn't get the doctor into trouble with her ex-boyfriend. "She thinks that whenever something good happens to you, you wait for something to ruin it. Some kind of bad karma."

"It's proven right thus far," Roy said.

"I think it's a self-fulfilling prophecy," Ed answered. "But that could just be me."

"Edward Elric," a nurse asked as she stuck her head out of the door to the exam rooms.

Ed stood, but he caught the woman's eyes darting over to Roy, an unreadable expression on her face. He thought this one must be the nurse who'd dated Roy that Havoc had been talking about at the apartment after his check-up.

Pondering Ed's words, Roy looked over at his son, playing with his cars. Despite everything Liam had been through, he was able to have an optimism that Roy felt had simply died in himself.

At least, he'd always thought so, but now, a tiny voice was telling him that he could have Ed if he wanted him. If he put the effort to bringing him back. If he put the effort into the relationship he always should have been in the first place. Everything Ed was doing now to help Liam, to help Roy, that proved something, didn't it?

And Roy had trusted Ed in ways he hadn't really with anyone before him, and in more ways than one.

_Ed lightly kissed over Roy's body, giving special attention to the scars at the shoulder, just as he did with those at his eye. He moved down to the others, the ones from fire alchemy that managed to stand out on the already pale skin. "You're awfully accident prone," Ed said. "And people talk about me with my automail." Gold eyes glittered as the young man looked up at him. There was no judgment, no disgust._

_Roy said nothing, merely ran his hand over the younger man's shoulder, over the metal and the scars that littered the golden skin._

_"So…" Ed asked as he moved his hand down, fingers toying with the trail of black hair that ran from __Roy__'s bellybutton to places lower. "At exactly what point did you realize you enjoyed being on your back with someone else between your thighs?" __Roy__ raised an eyebrow. "Or rather…" Ed's automail fingers played with the older man's right nipple, making him arch off the bed. They were sensitive enough as it was without the metal fingertips toying with them. "When did you realize you liked being a bottom? Who was it that showed you how good it can feel?" Ed's flesh fingers barely touched __Roy__'s member or his balls before moving back to toy with the opening beyond them._

_"I did," __Roy__ said._

_"You mean you played with yourself?" the blond let out a quiet moan. "But who was the first?" When __Roy__ didn't answer, Ed's fingers became more persistent. "Come on, I've told you about my experiences. Who was the first person to top you?"_

_Damn Fullmetal for wanting to have this conversation now, now that either hand was toying with him, but not doing enough to give him relief of any kind. "You…" Roy said quietly, but it was enough to make the blond stop and look at him._

_"Seriously?"_

_"No, I'm kidding," __Roy__ said with a roll of his eyes._

_"Shit," Ed said, leaning down and kissing __Roy__ fully on the mouth. "That's hotter than picturing you playing with yourself."_

_"Happy that I can be of service, now either get on with it, or I will go back to doing things solo," __Roy__ snapped._

_"Oh no, you won't." A flesh finger slowly pressed inside of him, just the tip, and __Roy__ knew he wasn't going to last for long._

"Major General?" the nurse, the same one who had called Ed back, said.

"Dad?" Liam said, tapping Roy on the knee. "You okay? You looked like you were daydreaming."

"I was, a bit," Roy said, and it had undesired results. _The former fuhrer, basic alchemical theory, his grandmother,_ his mind repeated until he felt his body calm down. "Sorry. Okay, Liam, let's get you back there."

The nurse looked at Roy expectantly as she led them to the second exam room.

"Up on the bed, little guy," the nurse said, patting the vinyl-covered padding of the table/bed. Liam easily climbed up, though it was obvious to Roy that his son hadn't appreciated being called a little guy.

"Let's check a few things first," the nurse said. Roy knew Havoc said he'd dated the woman, but he couldn't place her. That was a rather sad statement of the man's dating life before he'd ended up with Ed.

Blood pressure, temperature, pulse, all were fine. "Okay, just a quick check. Your chart says you haven't had chicken pox, and there's been a bit of an outbreak in the schools with it." She lifted Liam's shirt, his bare back looking wonderful to Roy, even as his own now bore the marks of a transmutation circle. "All clear." She smiled at Liam, then looked back at Roy.

"You don't remember me," she said, voice holding a slight bit of disappointment.

"I'm sorry," Roy said. "Have you changed your hair or… lost a little weight? Because I usually remember a face, and I just can't place you. I'm sorry."

"Paula Harrison," the woman said, showing her nametag. "We dated a few times a little over a year ago." She smiled.

"Oh," Roy said, not knowing quite what to say. "Well, you're definitely doing well for yourself now. It's very nice seeing you."

"Nice seeing you, too, Roy," she said. She patted Liam's back. "The doctor will be here in just a few moments."

Roy nodded and waited.

"Well, you look fine," Melissa said. "How are you holding up?"

"Doing okay, in spite of everything," Ed told her as he put his shirt back on. "So I have a clean bill of health?"

"Absolutely," the doctor told him. "Very healthy as always." She stilled for a moment. "Sorry. Kiefer rolled."

"Kiefer?" Ed asked.

"Riza and I liked the name," she said. "And we figured since we know the baby is definitely a he, we might as well start calling him by name." She looked down at her stomach sternly. "He's being a bit active today. I think he's going to grow up to be a boxer." Ed shared a smile with the woman. "Do you want to feel? Everyone always seems to."

"If you don't mind," he said as he raised his hand and pressed it to her belly. He didn't remember doing this with his mother when she was pregnant with Al, though she'd always sworn he had been amused by the growing belly.

Beneath his left hand, he could feel the baby moving and shifting, and he couldn't help but smile. It was a strange but amazing feeling.

"Melissa, maybe you have a different perspective than I do," Ed said as he pulled his hand away. "How could Liam's mother do this to him? My mom wouldn't have done anything to intentionally hurt Al or me, so how could she?"

"I don't know," Melissa said. "From what I've heard about her through Roy and Riza, she is a very ambitious woman, and never really wanted Liam, though she had to care for him. Regardless, I can't imagine why she would hurt her own son, even if it was to hurt Roy through him. Sadly, though, there are plenty of parents out there like her, who resent their children, who insult them, beat them, molest them and kill them."

"They could take a page from my father and just leave. The kids would be better off," Ed said as he put his uniform coat on.

"Sometimes," Melissa said. "It's one of the more unfortunate things about the world and my job."

Ed gave her a sad smile. "Guess you'd better see to the Mustangs now."

She nodded as she made her way to the door, her walking taking more of a waddling stride as the baby grew. "You know, Liam likes you. I think if Roy gets his head out of his ass, you could be very good for both of them. If you're willing to give them a chance."

"We'll see," was all Ed would say to that.

With a clean bill of health, Liam was flourishing. His teachers could not stop commenting on the boy's progress, how bright he was, how they were looking to advance him a year—which Liam was actually quite happy about, wanting to be in the same grade with Elysia—and how happy he seemed to be at school. The proud grin on the major general's face looked like it might split him in half each time he spoke to one of the boy's teachers. Things were going well, and fatherhood was really beginning to suit him.

A week had passed since they had encountered one another in the doctor's office, and now, Ed was sitting on the sofa in Roy's office, ready to give his report.

"Well, do you have any complaints about the decisions I've made?" Ed asked as he looked at the stack of papers sitting in front of Roy that the older man had just barely glanced over.

"I usually don't," Roy said. "I just like to hassle you to keep you on your toes.

"You're a bastard," Ed said.

"That I am." That earned the superior officer a look of surprise. "I'm capable of admitting that much." He skimmed over the forms one more time, but only so he wouldn't have to look at Ed as he spoke. "Liam has been asking about you. I wondered if you would be interested in maybe dinner sometime?"

His mind chided him for such a lame tactic, using his child as a way to get Ed on a date of sorts.

"I'll have to see what's going on," Ed said. "The state alchemy exam is coming up in a few weeks."

"Then you'll need a good meal more than ever," Roy said, still not looking up to meet Ed's eyes. "You work yourself so hard during the—" Roy's telephone rang, interrupting his train of thought. "Sorry, I should get this."

Ed inclined his head, though Roy caught the faintest look of disappointment in the younger man's eyes. "But really, think about dinner." And please say yes, Roy's mind supplied because he knew his heart was pounding in his chest anticipating rejection.

"Mustang speaking," he said as he answered the phone.

"Major General," a voice said on the other end, sounding worried, alarmed. "Someone has taken Liam from school when the children were out on the playground. We didn't see who it was, but one of the other boys said it was a woman and that Liam looked scared of her."

"Did the boy say what she looked like?"

"Brown hair was all he could remember," the teacher said. "I'm so sor—"

He hung up the phone. "Incompetent… damned, fucking…." He couldn't come up with a phrase to describe his anger at the moment, or one to properly express the feeling that something was eating him away from the inside out.

"Roy?"

"Liam's gone. Karen's taken him."


	19. Karma Lies

**Chapter 19**

Their train had left within a half hour, just enough time for Karen to have gotten the boy aboard another train and headed for Eastern Headquarters. The next train in that direction wouldn't leave until later that day, and that was if they were even certain the woman had taken it. Falman had proven exactly why he'd been part of the investigative team with Maes, as he'd found Karen had been staying at a hotel in town the night before, and that she had purchased tickets in her own name to take Liam back to Eastern Headquarters with her.

That train was leaving the station by the time the message came through from Liam's teachers, and it was out of range for radio to make it stop for a quick search of passengers. So instead, they had to follow it until the nearest depot. But until then, all that could be done would be to follow behind and hope to catch up.

The question in pursuing her was: Was she going to make it so obvious to follow her back or was this all a distraction?

Riza had told Roy it could easily have been a trap, and he understood that, which was why he didn't go charging after Karen himself. Instead, he had organized the team, gotten Lt. Colonel Armstrong involved, let Ed and Al both agree to go on the trek eastward. Roy called every command post along the way, hoping to catch Karen and Liam as they made their way to her home.

Sitting on a train, Roy was torn between his team, who were focusing on the investigation, and the alchemists, who were focusing on what Karen had done and could do. Riza, Havoc, Falman, Fuery and Breda along with Shezka were poring over maps, responding to radios communiqué and plotting every possible move that Karen could make.

In another compartment, Armstrong, Ed, Al and another alchemist Roy only knew in passing, called the Granite Alchemist, were all huddled over documents and transmutation circles. The four worked together on documents that Roy had been trying to keep secret since Nina Tucker had been killed. Documents that the military had been trying very hard to keep quiet and from the eyes of other state alchemists.

He stepped in with the other four alchemists again.

"This stuff is absolutely amazing," Major Lawson said. "Sickening, but amazing. Why the hell would anyone want to do this?"

"You can give a human animal characteristics and control the extent of those characteristics. The ability to move like a snake, to have the obedience of a loyal pet, to have the strength of a gorilla," Ed explained. "Though… are you sure you weren't part of an experiment once because your strength and intelligence could be comparable to a gorilla. Though I may be giving you too much credit."

The man rolled his eyes. "How many times do I have to apologize? I thought you put me pretty much in my place at the gym, Lt. Colonel."

"Just making sure you remembered."

Roy curled his hand into a fist. The friendly banter, as his son was possibly suffering at his mother's hand, infuriated him. But there wasn't much else that could be done.

"Major General," Lawson said, "did you need a seat?" He gestured to a spot beside Ed, but Roy just numbly looked at the seat and the young man.

To his surprise, he felt a glove-covered automail hand pulling him down onto the bench-style seat.

"I know you're at a loss right now," Ed said in a quiet, even tone, "but standing around isn't going to do any good. You know best how to deal with Karen because you know her."

"Not well enough, obviously," Roy said. "Or I wouldn't have left Liam with her."

"We know that," Armstrong said. "I know you would never have left the boy with her if you had seen what a monster she was. Who is going to expect that of a mother? For the Armstrongs, family always comes first, but that woman went against family. Who could possibly anticipate that? Mothers should not be so cruel to their own, innocent children, which is why they must always, _always_ be brought to justice."

Roy couldn't remember the last time he'd seen Armstrong look so cold. Not even at Ishbal. Even then, he'd been emotionally open, sad. Instead, he saw anger on the blond man's face and little else. There wasn't a doubt in Roy's mind that if Armstrong found the woman first, he would show no mercy. That gave the raven-haired man some satisfaction, because he knew what an angry member of the Armstrong family could do.

"So we need to find a way to combat this," Al said. "Some way to fight. What do we do?"

"If what the kid said was true," Ed said, "and it probably was, then mommy dearest is creating chimeras who are at least partially human, but with a variety of animals and at varying degrees of humanity left in them. The three of us…" Ed gestured to Armstrong, Al and himself. "Have fought against chimeras before."

"Fighting tactics all depend upon what the animal or animals have been combined with the human," Armstrong said seriously. "I think the major and I should stick with the animals who would rely on strength. A normal bullet won't take them down, but since we both use stones with our alchemy, we have a better chance of taking them down."

"What sort of animals are you anticipating?" Major Lawson asked.

"We have seen a bull before," Armstrong said. "I regretted having to fight him. He had once been a member of the military, but fate put us on opposite sides of the battlefield."

"Fate and the former fuhrer," Ed said. Armstrong nodded gravely.

"But he died with honor, as did the soldier who had been combined with the canine," Armstrong added, and the brothers nodded solemnly.

"And of course, there was Martel," Al said. "She was combined with a snake." He looked solemn at that, and Roy remembered vaguely that the chimera had been killed while inside of his armor. "She had the ability to move like a snake."

Ed stood and stretched. "Roy, want to go for a walk with me? Stretch our legs a bit?"

The older man looked up at Ed for a moment, his mind trying to piece together why the blond would be wanting time alone with him until finally, he nodded numbly and stood, deciding he'd at least take whatever he could get.

0o0o0o0

Ed could understand why Roy was behaving the way he was. Really, he could, but this wasn't the man that Ed knew. This wasn't the man who silently stewed after Maes Hughes had been killed, but plotted revenge. It was as though Roy had given up already, and Ed knew that couldn't happen for the kid's sake.

Roy followed him far too obediently, so Ed quickly tugged his hand, pulling him into an empty compartment—one reserved for when it was time for the team to rest.

"Talk," Ed said.

"About what, Ed?" Roy asked.

"Anything. Everything. I don't know when I've seen you this pessimistic."

"I barely managed to save him once, Ed," Roy said, taking a seat on one of the hard benches. "What makes you think I will be able to save him this time around?"

"Because you're his father. Because you're also Roy Mustang. You took down the fuhrer. You are moving through the ranks and very likely to become the head of the military if you keep things up. You have people here who dropped everything they were doing to support you and to see he gets back safe. Are you saying that you don't have faith in their abilities?"

"I trust them," Roy said. "They will do everything they can, but Karen was torturing him for so long, and I had no idea."

"I think it's how Liam wanted it," Ed said. Roy's head snapped up to look at the young man who was standing in front of him. "For you not to know. Do you want to know what I think, Roy? I don't think Liam is Karen's real target. I think it's you. I think this is a huge trap, and Liam will be fine. Shaken, scared, but physically fine. I think she's going to use him to lure you in, and he always suspected that."

"And if you're wrong?"

"And if I'm wrong, then nothing we can do can change the circumstances. But if I'm right and you go charging in with a fatalistic attitude, it will play right into her hands."

"I feel like no matter what I do, it's going to play into her hands," Roy said. "She knows my behavior far better than I ever knew hers. Obviously." He looked out the window at the quickly passing scenery, Ed's eyes following to look as well.

"Well, then you're a lucky bastard for having me here. I've dealt with more psychos in my short life than most will in a lifetime."

"Which is my fault," Roy said.

Ed rolled his eyes. "Yes, it's all your fault that I decided to try human transmutation, your fault that I lost my arm and leg, your fault my dad ran off when I was a kid. Right. All your fault."

"I take the blame for everything since then."

"I might have liked to have heard that when I was a kid, but you know, really you weren't. You protected Al and me from seeing some of the worst shit, whenever you could. Some of it, like with that bastard Tucker, no one could have predicted, just like this."

"I know you don't want a repeat of what happened with Nina Tucker," Roy said.

"Thank you, General Obvious for pointing that out," Ed said. "But that isn't the only reason I'm here. The kid deserves better, and you know, despite everything, I think you do too." They stayed there in silence for some time, Roy sitting, still looking crushed as he stared at the window. Ed stood in front of him, close to him, first watching the landscape and then turning his attention to the man. "You know, at some point, you have to stop trying to pay for Ishbal."

He got no answer from the dark-haired man. "I was talking to Melissa about you, and I think her theory was right," Ed said. "Care to hear what it was?" Still nothing from Roy. "She thought that you had a strong belief in karma, that you thought the world was conspiring against you to hurt you in retribution for what you did in the military. That it will take everything from you."

"When that is wrong, let me know."

Ed knew he was going to regret this later. He had thought of many ways to do this, and it would be after Roy came groveling back to him—when he was in a kinder, more forgiving mood, that was—but not like this. He had been in the right. He didn't need to be the one to fix things. And yet he was trying.

He placed his hands at either side of Roy's face and forced the man to look at him. "You have to stop punishing yourself for that. If not for you, how about for all of the people who would suffer for your defeatist attitude?"

The older man pondered that for a moment. Ed could practically see the cogs working in the older man's brain. The dark eye not covered by the patch of black fabric searched his face.

"For what I've done to you, for the kind of father I've been to Liam, you of all people should hate me," Roy said finally after some time. Yeah, it was no secret that Ed still resented his father and any other neglectful parents, but Roy was obviously not neglecting his son.

"Yeah, I should." Ed bent down until he was nearly an inch from Roy's face. "Funny thing is, I don't." And then he pressed his lips to Roy's and kissed him.

It was like falling, the way Roy's lips felt against his own. It was familiar and soft and wonderful. He might have his heart broken again by this man, and he knew that, but damn it if he didn't love him so much that he had to show him for once, just once, the world wasn't going to punish him for his past. Even in spite of his own actions. He loved Roy, always had, and he would risk being hurt so that he didn't see the older man suffer.

0o0o0o0

Roy didn't know what to think. Really, he was certain his mind had completely shut off. It couldn't make sense of it, why his former lover's lips were pressed against his own when he'd hurt Ed so much, why Ed was kissing him when they should be looking for ways to help Liam—though a part of him suspected the blond was already ten steps ahead—why Roy had risked this all in the first place.

Then, Ed's lips were gone and he was looking down at Roy expectantly.

"Why?" was all Roy could manage.

Ed shrugged. "Because I'm not a genius in everything, apparently."

The young man was still so close that Roy could feel his breath against his cheek. And before he really let his mind get to work again, his lips were pressed to Ed's once again, but it was his choice, not the blond's. His hands were in Ed's hair and he took what small comfort could be offered by having someone there who cared about him.


	20. Rare Animals

**Chapter 20**

The train rolled into the station, and Roy was back in control. He was giving orders to the local units and telling them precisely how to go about their attack. Ed had to admit it was nice seeing the old Roy back. The confidence the older man exuded when he was behaving like himself was something that really couldn't be imitated by anyone else in the military. Some of it was that cocky bastard-like attitude that had made Ed hate him so much as a teenager, but most of it was the genuine knowledge that he was aware of exactly what he was doing and that he had the authority so no one should ever question any of his decisions.

It irritated the hell out of most of the local troops, wanting to know who the hell Mustang thought he was. Of course, there were those that remembered he had once been running the show out at Eastern Command. He got genuine respect from those who remembered that. Of course, those that remembered him then seemed quite surprised to find Ed occupying the spot that Riza Hawkeye once had, as the person who seemed to be helping to hold him up and support him. Riza was still there, but it was obvious which of the two Roy was leaning on.

Ed ran into a few of the staff he'd once known, winning them over with a sort of charm and innocence—one that didn't really exist in him any more if it ever had—that had once worked when he was a kid. The higher ups had thought he was a brat, but the general support staff thought he was absolutely adorable as a kid.

"Has there been anything unusual?" Ed asked while Roy was trying to set up the best possible offense against Karen.

"We've noticed a few more foreigners in the area over the last few weeks," a lieutenant told him.

"Foreigners? Any idea from where?"

"They had harsh accents, some of them. I think Drachma or near the border," the young man said. "Not usually what we get in here. We're used to Xingians, or half-Xingians like the major general, but Drachman visitors are almost unheard of."

It was strange for Ed to hear Roy referred to as a half-Xingian, despite the fact that it was the truth. In Central, Ed knew that Roy's heritage was unique, but no one really commented on it, but here it was far more common and the soldier seemed to think nothing of making a statement of it.

"Has anyone tried to talk to them?"

"Yes, and they tell us they are here on a tour of the country, but according to the hotels, they keep renting out rooms on just a short basis, a few days, never more than a week, and then renewing it when the time expires."

"Like they're waiting on something," Ed thought aloud. Apparently, the lieutenant had the same idea, as he nodded at the blond's words. "We need to get in contact with the northern border. They might have heard some rumblings, or have a way of getting intelligence."

"I've contacted them already, sir," the lieutenant said. "I was suspicious, myself, and mentioned it to one of their communications people two days ago when we were discussing the regular trade of goods between the bases. They hadn't heard anything, but they said they had people who might be able to find out."

"Good instincts, Lieutenant," Ed said. The man, who was probably his age, beamed at the praise. Ed was not used to causing that kind of reaction in another, but managed a smile as he gave the other man a light tap on the arm. "Can you get me in touch with this communications officer you spoke to? We need to see if their information has changed in the last 48 hours."

The other man nodded and showed Ed to the radio room.

0o0o0o0

Roy was doing his best to organize a raid on Karen's house. If he thought he would be just facing her alone, he would have charged in with his team, Ed and the other alchemists, but he knew from Liam's own accounts that there were chimeras in the basement, held captive by the sadistic woman Roy still couldn't believe was the same woman he'd slept with eight years before.

Of course, things changed, as they were wont to do. Never would he have believed that the same brat who caused him so many headaches while Roy's subordinate would be one of the people he relied upon most, let alone that he would love the blond.

He watched Ed talking easily with the lieutenant, learning from his previous misunderstanding about Ed and Havoc to know that the interaction between Ed and the brown-haired man was just one of simple camaraderie mixed with some respect. On both ends, it seemed. Roy would have to ask what the lieutenant had done to make Ed give him that look. If it brought them all one step closer to getting Liam, then it was something Roy would want to commend.

The two disappeared as they turned a corner, but not before Ed met Roy's eyes and gave him a small, reassuring smile. Things weren't really right between them just yet, but Roy had some hope that maybe they could be in the very near future.

He turned to his team and proceeded to organize their raid, who would attack and from where, how to clear out the area so there would be the least number of damages possible, but without alerting any attention to Karen. That would be the most difficult task. It was quite possible that she already knew about the arrival of Roy's team, as she had once been in the military, and there could certainly have been those at the headquarters who would have more than willingly told her that he'd arrived with a small force.

However, he felt relatively confident this wouldn't happen. He had spoken to a few of the officers, asking his team to do the same with the other soldiers. It seemed that Karen had distanced herself from many of those in the military after she'd lost her license as a state alchemist. Her ranting and raving about the injustices of it, of how she was only trying to create a better Amestris had fallen on deaf ears and others began to view her as the lunatic Roy now knew she was.

But there was always a chance. Despite the fact that Karen had never been a very sociable person, she was intelligent as hell, and very good at manipulating others to suit her needs. She had obviously convinced her neighbors and some of the townspeople that Roy was a negligent father, a man who didn't have any desire to do more with his son than visit with him a few times a year, provide happy vacations while Karen was left to deal with the real world.

He would admit to anyone who asked that it wasn't the way he wanted it, that he wanted to be there for the discipline, to have to be the one to tell Liam no when he wanted to do something stupid or to be the person who had to deal with the daily cuts and scrapes that a seven-year-old boy got into.

He wasn't, though, and he had been there to provide only happy distraction. There was no falsehood in that aspect of Karen's claims, only that that was the situation that he truly wanted.

Though he had tried often enough not to, his thoughts went to Liam, of how confused his son would be the first time Roy had to sternly say "No," and of times when his son, who he loved more than he thought he ever could, would probably tell him that he hated him. It wasn't the pleasant future that awaited him that he was yearning for, but the reality, and it hurt. It hurt because he had a chance to be a real father, as his own had been, doing things for his son's best interest, and getting to be there for everything from the joyous to the painful to the simply mundane. He wanted that, and Karen was going to deny him of it if he wasn't careful.

"Chief," a voice said, as a hand patted his shoulder. "You need a moment to yourself?"

Roy realized only when he tried to focus on Havoc's face and found his vision blurred that he had been crying. He hadn't throughout the long train ride, trying to remain strong for the team, for Liam, but now it felt as though he couldn't stop.

"Go into your old office. The Colonel said that if you needed it, you were welcome to it," the other man said.

"Roy…" It was Riza now talking to him, another blond blur through his watery eye. "Go in there." She took his hand in hers and gave it a gentle rub. "I'll go with you." She must have caught Roy looking for a third blond blur, the person he had found comfort in on the train, because she added, "Ed's working with some of the lieutenants and talking to Northern Command. He thinks he might have a lead."

"No reason to stop him for this then," Roy said, wiping the back of his hand over his eye. It cleared things momentarily, but the tears still came. He followed as Riza tugged lightly at his hand, but surely in a discreet way. She managed to keep all appearances of his strong persona for the rest of the world, even when they both knew it was crumbling.

He walked through the room on instinct. There were a few changes from when this office had been his, a few more photos of family members—Roy had had none he could claim without endangering them—and some much improved seating. He joined Riza on the sofa, which felt much more inviting than any piece of furniture he'd had in the room when it had been his.

She wrapped her arms around him and let him cry. She never asked once which part of the whole situation he was crying about, and Roy was grateful because he was certain he couldn't have told her. There was so much already lost, so much now at stake, and Roy couldn't begin to properly express them all in a single sentence.

0o0o0o0

When Ed saw Roy again, he was exiting the office that he'd once occupied years ago. Ed recalled numerous fantasies about Roy and himself in that office—surprisingly, or maybe not surprising at all, most of them involved Roy in the position of power—but none involved the man with red, swollen eyes, his skin blotchy from apparent crying. He was glad Roy had managed to do it now rather than later, or not at all.

Ed walked over to the older man, taking the black piece of fabric from him, noting that the eyepatch was damp. Despite the loss of vision in that eye, the tear ducts still worked just fine. "No need for that now," Ed said as he stuck the patch into his pocket. "Come on. We think we may have an idea why Karen has gotten so obsessed with doing this."

"You have a lead?" Roy asked, his voice still sounding a little raw. Ed put a hand on Roy's arm, which earned him a somewhat doubtful expression that faded quickly. Sometimes, the older man reminded Ed of an abused dog, frightened that with each act of kindness, he might find himself in a position to lose everything all over again, waiting for kind words to turn to yelling or gentle touches to manhandling—and it hurt to see it there, because Ed wasn't that kind of person, not with Roy. Ed knew, though, that his idiot lover was waiting to be hurt because he felt he deserved it and not because he thought that Ed wanted to do it.

"Drachman visitors," Ed responded to the man's question. "Far more than you would expect for tourist season, not that this place even _has_ a tourist season."

His hand pulled lightly on Roy's sleeve as he led him into one of the other rooms, where the lieutenant could brief him on what they felt they had found out. Roy pulled loose from Ed's grip only to fill the hand that had pulled his coat with his own glove-clad hand. "I'm not very concerned with appearances at the moment," he said by way of explanation. Ed gave the hand a light squeeze as they walked together, understanding the man's need for human contact.

When they walked into the room, the lieutenant looked at the clasped hands for only a moment, but said nothing on it and did not act as though it bothered him in the slightest. Ed found his respect for the man growing quickly.

"So, based upon what I can see, it's been an almost textbook repeat of history," the lieutenant said. "Police reports noted a decrease in the homeless population, and there had been notes from various agencies about a decrease in stray animals, and the arrivals of rare animals coming into the train station."

"Rare animals?"

"Northern black bears, a snow leopard, and a high pedigree Amestrian Shepherd," the man said. "Among others, but those were the most notable."

"That dog is native to Amestria," Roy commented.

"It is, but this one had a pedigree a mile long and received an exceptional amount of training. It would cost someone a fortune."

"So, animals native to the north and a well-trained dog?" Roy asked.

"Along with strays, livestock, wild animals native to the area…" The lieutenant looked down at what they'd found and then back up at Roy and Ed. "Why wasn't anyone in the military made aware of this?" Ed could hear the almost accusatory tone in the man's voice, and he couldn't blame him. "We are taught about every type of mortar, every new bomb, each new style of state alchemy. Why not this? Why didn't anyone tell us that we could one day face a man who had the ability to rip through us with the strength of a tiger? Or told us so we could see all the obvious warning signs?"

"The state had the prerogative to keep it a secret so no one else would do it again," Roy said.

"That worked very effectively," the lieutenant said, then amended with a "Sir."

"Indeed it did," Roy said. "I didn't say that I agreed with the way the military handled things, but I do understand the reasoning for their decision. The former fuhrer kept it a secret because these were his secret weapons. After that, the military hoped by keeping them a secret, no one would try to make them again."

"Idiots," the lieutenant muttered.

"Fullmetal, is he by some chance a relative of yours? He has a very similar disposition."

"Not that I'm aware of, but I agree with him completely," Ed said. "Secrets never work, regardless of the intent or what's being hidden."

Ed knew that it was a bit of a dig at the older man standing at his side, the man whose hand was now rubbing at his back through his uniform coat. He loved him. He wanted to be with him and for Roy to forgive himself. But that didn't mean Ed wasn't still a bit mad, and those kinds of things weren't going to slip out from time to time.

But if anyone knew the dangers of secrets, Ed did. He flexed his automail hand, and Roy's hand gave him a reassuring squeeze at his shoulders. Roy had not caught the comment, seeming to have assumed Ed was talking about a secret far older that had cost him and Al dearly. That might have been for the best right now.


	21. Planning

_I'm a terrible author, I know. I haven't been posting lately, but I've got three chapters, including this one, to be updated. So, before you lynch me, here you are._

**Chapter 21**

Roy relied on the few contacts he already had in Eastern Command, combined with those that Lieutenant Everett—whose name Roy had to finally learn after spending an hour rehashing the raid—to subtly evacuate the blocks surrounding Karen's home. Liam's former principal and teacher had made calls to speak to parents attending the school, asking the parents and their children to come so that the houses would be empty. The lieutenant had a few friends who managed to come over, looking fairly innocuous as they explained the situation and got the various families out of their homes. They also ensured that no one called Karen to warn her about what was going on.

Actually, when most heard what it was Karen had done, they were horrified and wanting to find out how they could help.

The units waited until it was dark, positioning themselves around the house and leaving Roy to go in alone, or at least to appear to do so. The various alchemists on the mission—Ed, Al, Armstrong, Lawson—were all heading down to the cellar, but only once it was obvious that Karen's attention was on Roy, not on them.

Roy tried to think of how he would react if he had come alone, if he didn't know there were countless others there as back-up, if he hadn't had Ed and Riza to calm him down on the ride. He needed Karen to believe that he didn't have help in this. She would try to take him on, he didn't doubt it, but he still had the advantage of surprise.

"We're sure that she's here?" Riza asked Lieutenant Everett.

"While she managed to get off of the train without difficulty, neighbors have seen movement, and they believe they may have seen the boy," he answered with military efficiency.

"Then I need to go," Roy said. He took a deep breath and tried to steel himself for the confrontation and for the state he might possibly find his son in. His movements were slow as he walked through the yard. If he didn't have others, he might have tried to sneak up to the house, get to one of the windows and rescue Liam again. It made more sense than going to the door and knocking. Doing that would definitely make Karen suspicious, despite the fact that it would provide just the distraction that Ed would need.

Roy opted to go toward a darkened room in the house, on the first floor. The window wouldn't be hard to reach, and if she had locked it, he could always rely on his alchemy to undo it.

He made little noise in the yard, but with each branch he accidentally trod on, with each rustle of grass, he felt as though he might as well have signaled an alarm announcing his arrival.

And yet, no one came, no one noticed.

Reaching the blue house with its white trim, he placed his gloves to the window frame and tried to make it budge, but with no luck. She had locked it. To make matters worse, the old glass pane rattled in its wood encasement with each attempt he made. His gloved hands gave up, and they reached into pockets, looking for a small piece of charcoal or pencil to make a circle. White paint chips fell off the equally white fabric and stuck to his uniform pants. The house wasn't in a state of disrepair, but he certainly couldn't call what Karen had done thus far as good upkeep.

Charcoal found, he scribbled the circle onto the window ledge. More paint chips fell as the black markings were etched onto the wood. It crossed his mind that the loose paint was hazardous to having a child in the location, but he mentally reminded himself that paint chips were the least of his worries when it came to Liam's safety.

He pressed his hand to the now-completed symbol, charcoal marking the white gloves slightly before the circle activated and the window became a gaping opening in the wall. It was still a bit below Roy's waist in height, but he could get through it.

Roy began his attempt at a quiet climb into the house once the window was gone. For the moment, he was grateful that Ed wasn't nearby to see him. While Roy had a sort of smoothness to his movements in daily life, in moments like these, the climbing, jumping, fighting ones, it was Ed who held a grace all his own. The years of training in martial arts let the blond man move like a cat when he wanted to. He could have cleared the open window by placing both hands at the remaining frame and swinging his legs up inside effortlessly.

As it was, Roy was scrambling and hoping not to fall on his face inside. Admittedly, if he did fall, that would make for the perfect distraction to get Ed and Armstrong inside, but Roy really didn't want Karen to catch him scrambling on the floor of what looked like her dining room.

He slowly headed into the darkened room, moving around the dining room table and chairs. The area hardly looked like it had been used, though Roy knew that at one point, she had once been big on gathering around a table for dinners.

He couldn't be sure how she got to this point, what had driven her here, but he knew that he'd played a part in it.

_"My parents were very big on family values," she said before she pressed her lips to his, talking and moving tantalizingly close to his own. "Very big on all of that stuff."_

_"Stuff?" he asked, inwardly cursing himself for trying to draw a conversation out of the brown-haired woman when what he wanted out of her was anything but._

_"Marriage, family, settling down, family dinners, going to service on Sunday…" She began undoing the buttons on his white shirt as his own hands fumbled to pull off the black skivvy from beneath her uniform coat. He cursed the person who allowed women to wear the things. They were damned obnoxious when trying to get in a bit of extracurricular activities._

_"I never gave a damn," she said. He was glad, because a small part of his mind was telling him to run away, that she might try to tie him down with talk of marriage. "Live while you can."_

_Her lips were on his ear, and holy shit if she wasn't good at that. "I like the way you think," he said in a low moan. She was fantastic with her lips, and she was only nibbling on his earlobe. She wasn't even anywhere that would be normally considered erotic._

_"This is just a one-off," she said, as though __Roy__ would need reminding. He was usually the one reminding his bed partners that he wasn't looking for a relationship. "I just need someone to blow off some steam with, nothing more."_

_Roy__ nodded. He understood that much, and he felt the strangest twinge at the mention of being just a release, despite the fact that was entirely what he wanted. He would have the reconsider the way he approached things in the future, he thought._

_"Like I said," she repeated as she unfastened his pants. "There are some things I think are good ideas when it comes to family, but I think my parents underestimated the need for good sex." She looked him in the eyes and grinned. "And from what I've heard, you are the best."_

_"I aim to please," __Roy__ said as his hands finally removed the tight black material from her upper body and resumed kissing her again._

It had been an odd conversation to have over sex, and one that she would repeat later when she realized she was pregnant. Roy knew that, on no uncertain terms, she would want some sort of compensation for the fact that she was going to be caring for their son. However, he hadn't known the extent of what she would feel he owed her.

Apparently, it was blood.

He looked for any sign of struggle, any sign she'd hurt Liam, but he found none. The house looked in perfect order, if a bit underused. It had the air of someplace that had been closed up for a few weeks. There were some small changes, shoes with fresh dirt on them, a small coat draped over the top of the coatrack.

There was actually some care taken with Liam's things, and Roy hoped that it was a show of her treatment of the boy himself.

He moved through the house slowly, the sitting room looking as unused as the dining room. The radio looked untouched despite the fact that Liam had a few radio shows he followed religiously and Karen had always enjoyed music. There were signs of a happier life, photos of the two of them together, a framed painting Liam had done in class, books for leisure reading, etc. All looked entirely normal, and as though they should have had a happy life.

Roy stepped into the kitchen, noticing a tray with a half-eaten sandwich and a bowl of soup. A small cup sat on the tray as well, and if Roy was guessing, he would say the food had been for Liam based on the portions. It gave him hope that his son was okay.

He had to have hope for that. If he didn't, there was no reason anymore. If he failed his son at this, none of the reassurances from Ed or the rest of the world—no matter how much he genuinely appreciated them—would be worth it. He couldn't let Liam down.

A squeaking door brought Roy from his thoughts and he immediately raised his hand to torch the person coming from the basement door. The only thing that kept him from doing it the moment he heard the noise was the chance it might be his son.

"I don't think so, Roy," the voice said, and with a clap of gloved hands in a movement almost similar to Ed's, Roy found himself doused in water and thick, humid air.

Lt. Colonel Armstrong led the way into the side entrance beneath Karen's home. Ed couldn't explain—and didn't really attempt to either—how he could sense it, but he could tell there was residual alchemy here. This wasn't the work of equipment and manual labor to create this underground cellar, which meant there were far more possibilities for how it could have been laid out. With alchemy creating rooms in solid rock beneath the home's foundation, it could be a labyrinth that went beyond the scope of just Karen's property. It could even be multiple levels without even touching property boundaries.

Major Lawson was making surprisingly quiet, if slightly slow, work of the metal door to the eastern entrance.

"I'm going to go in first," Lieutenant Everett said, quietly.

"You've never gone up against any of these before," Ed whispered back at him. "You shouldn't be in the lead."

"Of the group of us," Everett told him, gesturing to the four alchemists as well as Havoc and Hawkeye, "I'm expendable. If someone's going to be a human shield, better it be the one you can afford to lose."

"Hey, if you've got a death wish, take it somewhere else," Havoc told him.

"And you are fairly prepared for what is inside," Hawkeye added. "You have been involved in every talk."

"Which means you aren't just a human shield," Ed hissed. "And these things might not be easily taken down by bullets."

"And that just goes to show that you are a lot more important than I am," Everett said. Havoc and Hawkeye did not look pleased at that, as he'd essentially called them expendable as they were not alchemists like Armstrong, Lawson and the Elrics.

"You want to stop arguing about who's going to play the fleshy body armor and get started into the warped zoo?" Lawson asked in his normally blunt way.

Ed nodded and followed behind Everett and Havoc as they walked in. The other three alchemists stood in line with Ed and Riza took up the rear.

They made their way into the darkened area slowly. The acrid odor of animals and filth wasn't quite overwhelming, but there were times when it nearly became so. They could also hear the sounds of voices, the clipped, harsh language unique to Drachma. Ed didn't speak the language, but the implication was clear enough.

It definitely went beyond just Karen Tyler.


	22. Into the Den

_I'm a terrible author, I know. I haven't been posting lately, but here is the second of three chapters promised._

**Chapter 22**

Ed clapped his hands, transmuting his arm into a long spear so that he could fight the Drachmans at the end of the hall. Al had mentioned a complex gas he could use if it came to it, but he said there could be unknown health risks if someone as young as Liam was exposed to it. The couldn't really know if Liam would be nearby and affected by the gas, so all Al could do was create a weapon for himself.

Ed was not pleased that his younger brother had chosen a staff rather than any of the countless other weapons that they were both trained in. While he might be able to use the staff to properly protect himself, Ed would have preferred something more effective than just a wooden staff.

The lighting inside the cellar was dim, but he could make out the figures of Drachman soldiers and a few officials staring at what looked like cages lining the walls. Havoc and Elliott held up their guns and began firing. They had opted for tranquilizer guns if they could get away with it, since the military's tranq weapons were considerably quieter. The alchemists cleared the way so that Hawkeye could get a few shots in as well before the Drachmans noticed their falling comrades and turned to find the attackers. As quickly as they could, the four alchemists ran in while the three sharpshooters fired their weapons at the remaining Drachmans.

Too busy fighting the soldiers and officials, Ed couldn't watch to make sure his little brother didn't get hurt. Now that Al was no longer a suit of armor, he was far more concerned about Al's well-being than he'd been before when they'd fought side-by-side

There had been six in this room, now all taken down one way or another, and Ed was left to question one who hadn't been knocked unconscious or killed.

"How many of you are there?" he asked, receiving no answer. "How many of you are there and how many of these chimeras?"

The man muttered something in Drachman.

"Listen to me, we will hurt you if you don't talk." He held his blade to the man's throat. "We will treat your wounds if you cooperate. Do you understand me?"

The man looked at Ed's blade passively, then back at him, muttering what sounded like the same thing in Drachman. There was no fear in his eyes even as he was facing death, so Ed gathered the soldier was not giving him the answer he wanted.

"Does he not speak Amestrian?" Ed asked.

"It doesn't matter," Riza said as she scanned the room in horror, taking in the sights of the half-human creatures inside of the cells that lined the walls. "He's giving you name, rank, serial number. I think that's all he's going to give you."

Ed tossed the man to the ground for Lawson to deal with. He turned his head away as the man began using some more "persuasive" methods to get the man to talk. Ed was a soldier, but sometimes, his stomach forgot that.

"Boss, you might want to have a look at this," Havoc said as he looked around the cells. In one corner was a tiny body. "It's small. Looks like it might be part cat. Wasn't there a tiger on the list of strange animals, one that was able to function in colder climates."

"A tiger and its cub," Elliot added from across the room.

The thing approached the bars of the cell and looked up at them. "Hurts," it said in a voice that no longer sounded human. It was all Ed could do to fight back the memories of Nina Tucker. "Want mommy."

"Where is your mommy?" Havoc asked.

"Dunno..." The half-tiger furrowed a furry brown and let out a pained wail. "Hurts."

"What's your name?" he asked.

"Want my mommy," it repeated.

"Brother," Al said, looking frozen in his place, "do you think it could be—"

"I don't know," Ed said. "I can't tell." He knelt down in front of the chimera's cage. "Do you have a name?" All he received in return was another moan of pain.

"It won't tell you," a voice came from behind one of the bars. "It can't tell you. All it remembers is pain and wanting its mother."

Ed turned to find something that looked more monkey than man hanging from the bars of his cage. White fur stuck up at odd angles on its head. Its mouth was somewhere between animal and man, allowing it to form the words, but making it a trouble to do so. It wore no clothes, leaving no doubt it was male, and it obviously inherited the prehensile tail and the ability to move its feet like a second set of hands. "It just got transformed two days ago. It hurts bad at first."

"You talk very well," Al said.

"Mistress left my brain more human. I don't think it hurt that monkeys are very close to humans anyway," the monkey said. "I used to be called Shane." He reached up to itch at his head, picking off a flea and eating it. Ed winced. "I am part monkey. It's easier not to fight the instincts."

"Do you know who it was before?" Armstrong asked, pointing to the cell.

"Nope. Mistress brought it in and locked it in a cage. Told it that it should prove to her she didn't waste a good animal on it."

"Are there a lot of soldiers here, Shane?" Al asked.

"Thank you for calling me Shane," the chimera said. "I have not been in a very long time. There are many soldiers right now. Mistress has a big project planned. Said it would give the soldiers what they wanted, what they'd asked for in the beginning."

"Brother, I bet Shane knows this place better than the rest of us," Al said.

"Oh, yes," Shane said. "Yes. I know it very well."

"I don't know," Ed said. While a guide would be very useful, something in his gut didn't feel right about this thing. It struck him that he had turned cold somewhere along the line that he was referring to this chimera as a thing. Just a few years ago, he defended a snake chimera and his armor-bodied brother as being entirely human. Now, he was referring to this chimera as a thing.

While he remained unsettled about Shane, Ed's own inner thoughts on the man being a creature and nothing more drove him to ignore the unsettled feeling. "Will you help us find our way through here?"

"Of course," Shane said. "Are you all alchemists like Mistress?"

"Some of us," Al answered with a smile. He was very good at getting others to trust him. He was also very trusting himself.

"Are you the only one who can talk?" Ed asked.

"Me and the kid," Shane said. "But he doesn't say much. The others here are mostly animal."

"I'm going to dismantle your cage," Ed said. "Stand back. And remember not to try anything funny with us."

"Of course not. I can show you around here. Show you the others." Shane backed away from the bars as Ed dismantled the metal. Once there was a hole in the cage, the monkey-man eagerly stepped through.

"Thank you," he said as he moved out of the cage. "This way. The next room is a good way off, but the other soldiers might have heard the gunfire in here. Be careful." He moved slowly, crouched down and occasionally using his knuckles to swing himself along the cement-like floor.

It was fairly obvious that Elliot didn't trust the chimera, as his gun was not at the ready for outside attack, but rather to send a bullet straight into Shane's head should he turn on them.

Walking along the corridors with Shane leading them, Ed still had the spike on his arm ready, not entirely sure what he would be faced with. They hadn't really anticipated a contingent of the Drachman army. The hallway opened up to another room, this one unoccupied by full-humans, but its octagonal shape held three cages on either wall. One looked to contain a partial wolf, snarling at them as they passed, another looked to be part bat, its arms gone and replaced with peach-colored webbed wings, a snout and upturned nose. Hooked feet were attached to still-human legs as it tried to gain flight within the cage.

Ed remained haunted by the tiger chimera, begging for its mother. He tried to pretend that it couldn't be Liam, that the boy wouldn't cry for his mother after doing that to him. After all, the cub had been brought in with an adult tiger, it could just as well have been crying for _its_ mother, but using a human voice to do so. Ed wanted to believe that Karen had no intention of using her boy for materials in a chimera. He had to believe that, because otherwise, it was unthinkable. It was better for this to be an elaborate trap for Roy than for the boy to be in one of these cages.

Not far away, Al nearly let out a startled cry as the chameleon-thing in the left cage near the exit of the room turned its face toward them. Its face had remained largely human, save for the enormous bulging eyes at either side of its head. They retained the human iris and pupil, but rotated like the animal's would have. A long tail curled as reptile-like feet shuffled along the floor. Its color changed from an odd brown-gray to green as it saw them.

Ed would have called the look one of hope, but he knew there was nothing he could do for the former human. There was no restoring them to their human form.

"This way," Shane said, still sounding surprisingly upbeat. Admittedly, as part wild animal, he would probably enjoy the ability to move about, but the niggling feeling in the back of Ed's mind continued to trouble him. Did he fully trust Shane to direct them as they came to a fork in the road? "To the right, not the left."

"What is at the left?"

"More animals," Shane said. "You want to see Mistress, don't you?"

"Lawson, Armstrong, can you handle yourselves if you go left?"

"Going left wastes your time," Shane said. "Come right with us."

"Can you handle yourselves if you go right?" Lawson asked. It was fairly obvious by the Granite Alchemist's tone that he didn't trust the chimera. Ed wanted to, hoping that Shane was like Martel, a bit changed for the whole thing, but not intending any ill will toward them. However, the nagging voice in the back of his head was back at full force. It wasn't a matter of whether or not Shane was still human. Even humans could be untrustworthy, regardless of what they had been put through in their past. He knew that even as a chimera, Shou Tucker had been evil.

"This way to Mistress," Shane said as he walked ahead.

"This way to a trap, more like," Lawson said quietly.

"Maybe it is best if we stay with you, Edward," Armstrong said.

Ed gave a short nod. If he suspected that in trying to get Roy here, that had been a trap, then why wouldn't Shane be one as well? Ed knew he'd have to be quick to fight against someone with the physical abilities of a monkey, but he knew that he could manage it. He had fought his brother and his teacher. Sometimes at once. He could withstand a fight against Shane.

0o0o0o0

"Wakey, wakey," Karen said with a lilt in her voice. "Come on, Roy. I'd hate for you to be asleep during this."

Roy cracked an eye open and saw Karen as he'd once remembered her. There was no groveling, no begging as there had been in their last conversations. Back again was the confident woman he'd gone to bed with and had a child with. He would have been happy for that fact if he didn't know what it meant.

Her freckled cheeks were flushed with excitement as she looked down at him, tucking a piece of brown hair behind her ear.

"What did you do to Liam?" he growled at her as he tried to move, but finding that in his weakened state, he was not able to fight the pull of whatever she'd done to him.

"Liam? He's upstairs in his room. He's not happy to be there because he's scared of me right now," Karen began removing the white gloves she had been wearing to transform the air into water vapor and then water to defeat Roy.

"I can't imagine why he would be scared of you," Roy said with a sarcastic tone.

"Sarcasm is the lowest form of humor," Karen said, looking down at him. "Do you think I _wanted_ to have to hurt him? He's my son, and one day he'll realize I did this for both of us. You weren't helping me with the Amestrian government, so I had to seek funding elsewhere. I gave you countless opportunities to help me, but you never did."

"And where are you getting your funding?" Roy asked.

"Drachma," she said as she walked around the circular room, as though checking for any signs of problems with the floor. Looking down below him, he saw a large transmutation circle. His foggy mind vaguely remembered it as the one Ed had shown him. "They are interested in a state alchemist who is willing to obey orders without question. The problem is that they just don't have the people with the talent to do it, and Amestrian livestyles are so different from Drachman they can't manage to keep our guys and girls for long."

She quietly whistled and snapped her fingers, drawing a dog out from one of the distant corners of the room. "Come on, boy." The dog, a shepherd of some kind, but not one Roy was familiar with slowly stepped out into the room and stopped at Karen's side, where she stood atop the circle. "Sit." The dog immediately listened to her command and sat. "Good boy."

"Are you going to try to make me an official dog of the military?" Roy asked.

"Something like that," she said. "Now that I know you have the tattoos on your body."

Roy struggled again, making it only up so far as his hands and knees. "Why would you say that?"

"You have an ex in Central who informed me of it," she said. "You really should treat your former girlfriends better than you do, Roy."

Could she have meant Melissa? Melissa was the only one aside from Ed who knew, but… why would she do this to him?

"This won't work," Roy said. He didn't want to tell her he didn't have the whole circle, but he saw another flaw in her "brilliant" plan. "If you make me an obedient dog, I won't be capable of performing alchemy any longer."

Karen tutted as she walked outside of the circle, the dog obliviously panting a few feet from Roy. "Roy, do you think I'd waste a perfectly good dog and flame alchemist if I wasn't sure it would work? You and I both know that Shou Tucker still managed his alchemy. And I've had remarkable success myself. Once I'm done with you, I'll have to introduce you to Shane. He is my greatest achievement yet. Odd man, though. Actually had a fetish for being turned into an animal."

With a smile, she pressed her fingers down on the circle and it began to glow. "All the better for me."

0o0o0o0

Heading into another of the octagonal-shaped rooms, Ed saw this one had only four places and four doorways into other halls. If Ed was going to set up a trap, this was where he'd do it. He looked at the snarling animals in the four cages and tried to see back into the hallways.

"You should have listened to the Major," Shane said with a smile as he slammed his monkey-like feet to the ground and Ed could feel the alchemy happening as all four of the cages exploded open. "The Crimson Alchemist was always a hero of mine." He flipped back onto his front paws and Ed could finally see the transmutation circles tattooed onto his feet, done the same way that Liam's tattoos had been.

"Shit!" Ed yelled out as he tried to go after the monkey-man, noticing that more Drachman troops were flooding the room as animals that looked to be part wolf, tiger, bear and bird immediately set upon the four alchemists and three soldiers.


	23. Dangerous Alchemy

_I'm a terrible author, I know. I haven't been posting lately, but here is the third of three chapters promised._

**Chapter 23**

Ed tried to avoid debris from the most recent bombing. "Shit!" he yelled as another stone came crumbling down, nearly hitting him this time. Lawson easily dodged the rest of the debris. It was irritating to realize that this had been thoroughly thought out. Shane's explosions were causing damage and bringing rubble and shrapnel onto the Amestris soldiers, but at no point did Ed feel as though there was going to be a cave in. Ed knew that he had to go after the monkey chimera, as he was causing the biggest distraction for the rest of the team. It was hard enough to focus on the different chimeras and soldiers without also trying to dodge minor explosions.

The problem was that Shane's chimera status made him next to impossible to catch. The half-monkey moved with ease along the room, swinging along rafters that Ed almost suspected had been put there for the soul reason of aiding the chimera's attacks. He watched as Everett fired a round of bullets into one of the chimeras, a part polar bear, it looked. The thing was unfazed.

Riza seemed to be having the same luck with the part-yak that was charging toward her, her gun hardly doing more than irritating her. The others were busy fighting, trying to stave off the chimeras and the soldiers. Another thing, a wolf of some type, but with far more human qualities than the others, was busy going after Everett and Lawson, who Ed was glad to say could fight considerably better in the field than he had in the ring at the gym.

Ed's focus remained on the betrayer, the one still swinging around, causing distractions for the rest of them. The one that Ed should have trusted initial instincts about because something had felt off from the very beginning.

Ed realized now what a liability it was having Al in the field, something that Roy had warned him of and he'd long suspected. The younger brother was fighting, very well, in fact, but he was determined not to kill. He was using that staff when a spear or a gun would have been better, and his fighting was stilted by his mind trying to not only get a good blow in at the right time, but getting it so that it didn't do permanent damage to the person he was fighting. Ed's own concern for Al was making it difficult to focus solely on Shane, who continued his swinging until he was directly over Al's head.

Shane paused only to grin at Ed as he reached his hands down toward Al, whose head was within easy reach for the chimera dangling by his back legs from a rafter. The blond's mind split into a few dozen thoughts as he cursed his brother for being so darned tall, cursed Karen for possibly costing him his little brother, wishing maybe he'd never recovered Al's body because they could always get a new helmet, wanting nothing more than to see Shane dead, and trying to figure out the best way to get up to him to do it.

With a cry of "No!" as he almost inhumanly tried to climb the wall to get to Shane, Ed brought his transformed arm up and into the monkey chimera's gut, just before his hands could clap down on Al's head. Though Ed knew he'd made contact, knew he'd kept the monster from getting his little brother, his mind still visualized, for just a second, the primate hands pressed to either side of Al's head, turning him, turning his head into a bomb, blowing him up.

"Brother!" Al's voice said, sounding panicked. But it was there, and that shook him from the grotesque imagery in his mind as he looked first at Al, whose eyes were firmly on Ed's automail arm. He heard the gurgling laughter coming from the chimera as his body fell to the ground, hands sliding down Ed's arm as he descended. His arm... the thing had turned it into a bomb.

Someone, Everett, Ed believed, fired a round into Shane to ensure he didn't move his hands again, to ensure he didn't move anything again.

His left hand scrambled up to his right shoulder, fingers digging into the joint at his shoulder and tugging. "Help me, Al," he said, despite the chaos which surrounded him. He only half noticed that both he and his brother were covered in blood, Shane's blood. Al dropped the pole to grab at Ed's automail arm.

They tugged and Ed screamed.

"I'm sorry, Brother," Al said, backing off slightly as wires could be heard tearing and breaking.

"Don't apologize," Ed shouted through his pain. "Pull!" They ripped his automail arm off and tossed it into one of the cells. Armstrong and Lawson, who had been putting up amazingly effective fights with two of the chimeras managed to force the two beasts into the cell with the arm, one landing atop it as it exploded, the other getting fatally wounded in the process. The room rumbled and shook, but it didn't collapse, which meant this was a definite trap, which meant Roy was in real danger if Karen had thought things through this much.

The lingering pain was still there. Automail wasn't made to be ripped off, but adrenaline was rushing through his body, preventing him from really feeling the pain. He hurt, no denying it, but it was distant. He knew he hurt, he felt it vaguely, but it wasn't as though it really was him who was in pain, not with how he knew it hurt. Though putting the arm back in always hurt more. Glancing back at the debris and carnage where his arm had once been, putting it back on wasn't going to happen soon.

The soldiers had fallen, two of the chimeras were gone as was Shane and the other two looked nearly at that point. He felt the rush of alchemy being used somewhere nearby. It was like alchemy had become a part of him with how he could sense it now. He didn't know what she was doing, but he could guess, and he could feel it in his veins, the energy that only alchemy provided.

"I need to get to Roy," Ed said.

Al nodded. "We can handle it."

Ed didn't know if he believed his brother. The others, yes. He didn't know about Al, but for once, he had to focus on something other than his baby brother.

0o0o0o0

_Liam's birth, the little boy behind the glass at the hospital._

_Ed turning red at the mentions of Psiren and her attractiveness._

_Growing up as half-Xingian, being bullied for it. Meeting Maes, who didn't bully him, who protected him. Maes was less than an eighth Xingian. You couldn't tell, but he stood up for those who were more obvious._

_Maes's funeral and Elysia's painful cries for her father. It should have been him, not his friend._

_Being shot by Archer, the feeling of the blade so fresh in his shoulder still as the new pain started at his eye._

_Going to the zoo with Liam and watching the little boy hold a snake with a look of awe on his face._

_Ed pushing into his body, in and out, creating a steady rhythm as they rode one another. Switching later because while __Roy__ might have enjoyed the feeling of Ed inside of him, he enjoyed being in his lover nearly as much._

_Having sex with Karen, nails scraping down his skin._

_Liam playing with Ed the cat, looking so small and so lost because of what his mother had done to him, how he'd been hurt by her, how he feared he'd be taken by her again._

"Enough!" he yelled as the light faded and he looked up at Karen. She only smirked at him.

"So you didn't transfer the whole circle onto your body then?" she asked as she walked around the array she'd drawn. "Who took the rest of it for you then?"

"Didn't you plan on that, Karen?" Roy spat. "I thought you planned for every eventuality."

Her brown eyes narrowed and she crossed her thin arms at her chest. The gloves remained on her hands. "Tell me who, so that if they die, I can check their body. If they live, I don't duplicate my work."

"Fuck off," Roy said.

With a smile, she brought her hands together and transmuted the air into water that knocked him flat onto his back. The circle on the floor prevented him from getting back up after the deluge stopped. "You aren't going to like this if you don't talk."

Roy said nothing, even as she clapped her hands together again, forcing rain over his face. It felt like he was suddenly laying upside down, in one of the hardest storms he'd ever experienced. He couldn't move thanks to the transmutation circle, and he found himself struggling against the water, struggling to get his breath.

The water stopped, and she walked over toward him. "So… any answers, Roy? I might stop if you have one. I might not, too, just because I do have to admit I like hurting you."

Roy gasped for air, but said nothing. He wouldn't endanger Ed. He couldn't.

"You always were too stubborn for your own good." She brought her hands together again, and once again, the water poured over his face, triggering what felt like a gag reflex, fighting the water from going down into his lungs, though it never seemed to be heading there in the first place. He couldn't tell, he couldn't think. All he could do was struggle to survive.

"Roy!" The water stopped, and it left Roy gasping for breath, struggling so hard to look over, to turn that tiny bit just to see a one-armed, blood-covered Ed running toward him. He looked worried, relieved, angry, all at once. Roy couldn't find the words to ask what had happened. He couldn't even find the air to tell Ed not to step onto the array, the array that wasn't blatantly obvious the way it was drawn on the floor because Karen had planned the trap, first just for Roy, but now, before Roy could manage to stop Ed where he was, she had them both. Roy watched in sickening horror as Ed froze on the spot and then cursed as he saw the circle beneath his feet.

"So this was where you put the rest of the circle," Karen said with a smile. "Karen Tyler. I don't believe we've met, but I'm more than aware of you, Lieutenant Colonel Edward Elric. I do hope that the blood isn't yours."

"You bitch," Ed cursed, wiping blood that had been trickling down his red-tinged hair and into his face. "No, if you must know, it's your pet Shane's."

Karen actually had the sense to look sad at the loss. "I had high hopes for him," she said. "Of course, to face off against you and your brother, that had always been a goal of his. He must have gotten sloppy." She frowned and walked over to the blond. "So you have the symbols then? That's why you can't move?"

"I was never good at freeze tag," Ed said, scowling at her. "Not this good. But I don't just have the symbol from Liam. I have a bit of the cat as well. You transmute us, you risk blowing us up."

"Actually, no," Karen said. "There was nothing you could have gotten from your namesake that could blow the two of you up." She's smirking now. "I tested just to be sure. In case Roy wanted to be a hero. Or you did, I suppose. The circle on Bowser here will overrule anything I put on the cat." She shrugged, scrunching her nose slightly as she did, the freckles that Liam had inherited more noticeable in the action." Karen walked from the circle, away from Ed, and Roy's eyes followed her. "It seems a waste to combine the two of you and your abilities. I could probably get more money for you as two chimeras rather than one, but if I pass up the chance of combining both the Flame Alchemist and the Fullmetal Alchemist, I know the Drachman military will be furious with me."

"So you are working for them?" Ed asked, flailing his remaining arm. Roy's movements were limited. A turn of the head to look between his former fling and his lover took a great deal of effort on his part.

"Of course," Karen said. "I had brilliant ideas, always did, but the Amestrian government never recognized them. The Drachmans nearly bend down and kiss my feet."

"You'd turn on your own people?"

"What people? I have Liam. That's all I have and all I need."

"You were going to use him in a transmutation!" Ed shouted.

"I unfortunately had to use him as bait, but I love my son dearly. Even if he looks too much like his father." Karen smiled. "Enough banter. You're stalling the inevitable, and if your friends survive, it could be useful having a trained alchemist fighting for me rather than against me." Roy looked at Ed, noting that either turning his head was getting easier or he didn't have to turn so far to see the blond.

"I'm sorry, Ed," he said as her hands met the circle.

"Nothing to be sorry—" Ed's voice was cut off as the light again reappeared, there was more pain this time than last. Memories focused more on him and Ed than the last time.

_Ed pale, just lost his arm and leg, small and fragile. Still, this boy, if he could manage a human transmutation, he was perfect material for the military and __Roy__'s advancement._

_Lips crashing against lips. The fulfillment of lusting after the young man for so long, perhaps too long. He had been so young when __Roy__ first noticed that he thought of Ed in a way other than as his subordinate._

_Yelling at Ed after Nina Tucker's death. Feeling like a total asshole after he'd done it._

_Fighting against the young man, getting a flashback at the end of it that stopped him from firing that final blow at Ed._

_Being held by the same person he'd tried to humiliate years before when he woke up from a horrifying nightmare._

_Being the one holding Ed when the young man woke up from his._

_Knowing that moment when he fell in love with Ed, but just waiting for it to end. Everything good that happened to __Roy__ always did._

_Goading Ed about his height because it was just damned fun_

_Fighting with Ed because __Roy__ refused to open up._

_Finding the cat in the alley to take home and eventually give to Liam, knowing Ed would likely never know. Wouldn't want to teen to know he had a heart._

He felt the alchemy trying to break him down, more so than before, but still… something wasn't right. His back felt on fire, but though it tried to reconstitute him, it wasn't working.

0o0o0o0

Ed laughed as the light faded. He laughed at the shocked expression on Karen's face, mocking her. She looked surprised it had failed. She had gotten smug, been too confident in her skills. If there was anyone in the state military that knew what ego could cost someone, it was Ed. He used his experience to his own benefit this time around and plan ahead. Self-importance had no place in alchemy.

"You set a trap and plan to include me, you had better know who the hell you're dealing with," Ed said, taking a few struggled steps toward the woman. He couldn't move easily, but he could move. "You should also know how many people are loyal to this man. How many people are willing to go through the pain of getting that damned tattoo for the sake of him."

"You split it up among others," Karen growled.

"Duh," Ed said. "The more people it's spread among, the less likely we're all going to be here on this transmutation circle."

"You're only delaying the inevitable," she said. "All I need to do is find out just what you don't have on you."

She clapped her hands together, attempting to do to Ed what she'd done to Roy, but the young man was able to dodge it in a way that Roy knew he couldn't. Was sure he couldn't, as he was still slammed down against the floor unable to move even a finger.

"You'll wear yourself out," she said. "The array saps your energy each time it's activated. Look at your lover there."

She placed her hands down on the array again.

_Visiting __Roy__ at the hospital and seeing what had happened to the man's face, to his shoulder. Ed had survived remarkably intact, his brother in recovery from massive dehydration and lack of good food while on the other side of the Gate, but he'd recover._

_Posing for a photo with the rest of __Roy__'s team, feeling a part of it for once._

_Realizing for the first time that he had no interest in women because his first fantasy, and most recurring fantasy, was of Roy Mustang._

_Thinking __Roy__ was a complete and total bastard for implying that Ed owed him for keeping the secret._

_Smiling tiredly up at __Roy__ as he sat at Al's bedside. "Should you even be up? You look like shit, Mustang." The older man handed over a candy bar to the teen._

_The scars that litter Roy's back, far more scattered than Ed's own, and probably just as many._

_Blurting out "I love you" in a moment of passion._

_Pressing against __Roy__ as—_

Ed barely registered the sound of a bullet as it whizzed through the air. Karen's body slumped down to the ground. For just a moment as he witnessed the scene, the teen felt remorse for Liam's loss, because if the gunshot didn't kill her, something certainly would once she was captured. His momentary thought, empathy for a fellow boy who would lose his mother, disappeared as he struggled to get over to Roy.

"Are you okay, sir?" Riza's voice called from the tunnel.

"I'm fine," Ed said. "Tired but fine. The others?"

"Your brother is treating the injuries," she said as she approached. She didn't seem to be elaborating.

"Can you scratch away some of the array, Captain Hawkeye?" Ed asked as he checked Roy, who had a steady pulse but was definitely unconscious. "I can't move well, and Roy can't at all like this."

Ed tapped his lover's face. "Roy… Wake up. Please."

Dark eyes fluttered open a moment before shutting again. It was a small response at least.

Ed knew the moment the array was broken, as the lethargy that had been enforced on his limbs felt as though it had never existed.

Riza, followed by a bloody Armstrong came into the room, Armstrong going over to Karen, Riza checking on Ed and Roy.

"A perfect shot as always," Armstrong said as he got to Karen's body. He closed his eyes for a moment and looked down at her with a sad expression on his face. He placed his hands to the ground and restrained her to the ground. "Better safe than sorry. She planned out far too much. I'm going to find Liam and get him out of here. Captain Hawkeye, please, see to the Lieutenant Colonel and Major General."

She nodded, though she obviously didn't need to be told otherwise.

"Liam," Roy croaked as he finally opened his eyes and rallied slightly.

"Armstrong will find him," Ed said. "I'm sure of it."


	24. Aftermath

_This is the final chapter. It may be a while until I post again, as I'm working on a FMA big bang. So when that one is done, no long waits for posts._

**Chapter 24**

**Aftermath  
**

Roy wasn't paying much attention as some of the Eastern Command soldiers hoisted him onto a stretcher. "His body's still in shock," Ed said, sounding strangely distant at the moment. "She tried to break it down multiple times, so be careful with him." Roy wanted to argue that she'd done the same to Ed, that Roy knew this for fact because he'd gotten a strange view into the blond's mind, his memories. Unfortunately, he didn't have the power or strength to vocalize those thoughts or tell Ed that he needed treated as well. The younger man had once again experienced having his automail arm ripped off. Roy knew well enough by now that having that automail torn off like that hurt Ed and did damage to the younger man's nerves.

He could feel a hand now brushing aside his hair as the stretcher moved. He glanced up to see Ed was walking stiffly at his side. Roy knew he didn't deserve that either. Ed looked down at him for a moment and gave Roy a reassuring smile, which made him glance away to once again look for any sign of a dark-haired boy or the muscular alchemist.

"Armstrong'll find him," Ed's voice rasped quietly as they moved through the winding catacomb-like basement. The teen was still covered in blood and looked like he'd been run through the ringer, but he was trying to assure Roy. And his hand continued to rub at either Roy's shoulder or his head, a presence that was likely the only thing keeping Roy sane as he waited and tried to hope.

With some struggling to find his voice, despite the pain that the shouting of earlier had caused his throat. "You're sure that he's not... here somewhere?" Roy hadn't gotten to see much more than that single room where Karen performed her alchemy. Looking around now, at the cages where some of the chimeras still resided, he had to wonder if one of them held his son.

"I won't believe it," Ed said with certainty. "Not until I see it for myself. And you shouldn't either."

"Not that I want to either," he closed his eyes for a moment, trying to will away the thoughts of the worst that could have happened. History seemed to prove that Roy deserved to suffer. Good things didn't tend to happen to him. His eyes scanned the cages, as though trying to find some signs that they might contain a chimera that might contain his son.

"He's not there," Ed said as they ascended the stairs leading from the basement area. "He's not down here. Try just once to have a little hope." It was still dark out, but there were the faintest bits of rising sun. It had taken some time to get them out of that place, taken some time to comb the area before they removed Roy from the secured transmutation area. He hadn't realized until now just how much.

He could see the faintest fingers of light spreading through the sky. It was almost beautiful to finally see daylight.

"Sir?" a woman asked, and Roy nearly told them that this wasn't the time to be asking him for orders. To his surprise, he saw that the soldier was addressing Ed. "Sir, what do we do with the chimeras? I was told you knew how to deal with them."

Ed nodded. "I'll see to that in a few moments."

"What are you going to do?" Roy ventured to ask.

"I'll let you know when I decide."

It would be difficult, Roy knew. After all, Ed had known chimeras who had been more than functioning, and in the same breath, Nina Tucker had been in agonizing pain. From what Roy understood, most of the chimeras Karen created were the latter, rather than the former, or they were little more than blood-thirsty, strong animals, but that wouldn't make giving the execution order any easier

It was a decision Roy should have made to spare his lover. He knew that. Besides, Ed needed medical attention. Why not leave it up to Armstrong?

But Armstrong was investigating the house.

But then, Roy realized that no, the man wasn't.

He was leaving the front door of Karen's home and Roy strained to see if the man was alone

"Daddy!" a voice cried out as Armstrong moved out of the path of the door and Roy watched as the darkheaded mop bounced with each jogging step. Never had the military man thought there had been a more pleasant sight in the world as that of his son in a pair of black and white striped pajamas running down the back lawn with his arms out and happy tears on his face

"Stop!" Roy commanded the men carrying him on the stretcher, finding his strength back. "Stop walking. Let him catch up!"

"Faith is an amazing thing," Ed said. "And so, apparently, is your kid."

The stretcher was lowered to the ground and Roy soon found himself pounced by his son. The boy's iron grip was tight as his arms wrapped around Roy's neck. "You're okay! You're here and you're okay."

"Of course I am," Roy said as he wrapped his arms around Liam's back. "Of course. If I couldn't take care of myself, Ed definitely could." He smiled. "What about you? What did your mother do when she got you back?"

"She was getting me ready to move to Drachma." His eyes scanned the people coming out of the basement area. Roy took the moment to take in the sight of his son, from his straight black hair that hung into his brown eyes to his freckled cheeks and pale skin. There was something frantic in the way that he looked back at the house and at the doorway from which Roy and Ed had come. "Is she going to jail, Dad?"

Roy took a deep breath and tried to prepare himself for how to answer. "Liam… they tried to get her to stop, but in the fighting and everything, Karen was…" He couldn't say that while Karen was torturing him, one of Roy's own people, one whom Liam liked, shot Karen dead. "Your mother died, Liam."

"No," Liam whimpered. "No, no, she can't be. Mom…" He rubbed his eyes, fighting off the tears once more. "No, Dad. Don't let it be true," Liam begged as though his father had the ability to alter the course of events and to change the world. Even Roy found himself wishing it was true.

"I'm sorry," Roy said, letting his son bury his head on his shoulder. "I'm so sorry, Liam."

"Mommy," his son cried into Roy's uniform, only to look up and see the body bags beginning to be hauled out and cry louder. It broke Roy's heart. It was a hurt that he couldn't fix for his son, no matter how much he might try. He couldn't give him back the mother that he loved and he couldn't take away the pain of knowing there was no longer a chance she might at least become the parent she'd once been.

Ed walked away at that, feeling it was better to deal with the chimeras than get involved in this family moment. Though he'd gotten attached to Liam, he knew that the boy needed to be with his father. He'd lost his mother, and sometimes he didn't doubt that had he had his father there with him and Al, they wouldn't have attempted a human transmutation.

"Sir?" the soldier asked who had approached him earlier. "Do you know what we should do with the chimeras?" Ed saw Armstrong approaching, and though Al was within earshot, he didn't bother flagging his brother over for his opinion nor did he bother to send him away so he didn't hear what the inevitable was. He knew that Al would want to spare them all, and that simply wasn't an option.

"Armstrong!" he called out, bringing the tall man over. "Good job, first of all, in getting Liam back here."

"It looks as though his mother was finally proving herself to be one," the man said. "His good condition is due to her treatment." Which proved it had all been some set up to get Roy there.

Ed nodded. "I need your opinion on what to do with the chimeras. Some are capable of speech, but do you think this is something the military can deal with?"

Armstrong thought for a few moments. "I don't know that we can. The last time the military had chimeras, that didn't end well. Admittedly, they were caged up like animals for some time, and they still managed to be more human than some current soldiers for the military. However, I'm just not sure."

"Have we found any with higher intelligence?" Ed asked the soldier.

"Just the tiger," the woman said. "And he isn't saying anything other than how much it hurts and asking for his mother. She didn't seem to be working on many with actual intelligence. Just brute soldiers."

"Then the answer is simple. I'll create a gas. We'll flood the tunnels with it. It will kill them painlessly."

"I can create it, Edward," Armstrong said. "You need to get treated by the medical team."

"Brother…" Al's voice said tentatively from behind. "You can't mean to just kill them."

Ed turned and smiled sadly at Al. "It has taken a long time to realize it, but I know now that Scar did us a favor by putting Nina out of her misery. I could never have done it. The military would have tested her. She'd have been in pain, just like the chimeras down there all are right now."

Al closed his eyes. Ed knew that expression; he'd worn it often enough. Al was trying to deny that what Ed was saying was absolutely correct. And at the same time, he was trying not to see Ed as some kind of monster for plotting the deaths of all of those once-humans in the basement. The fact that Al wasn't putting up more of a fight told Ed that at least a small part of his little brother that knew he was right. That small part would have to win out over the rest so that Al didn't resent Ed later for making this decision.

"If you know of the transmutation, Alex," Ed said, preferring to use the man's first name given the current circumstances, "then I'd be fine with you doing it." He glanced over at Roy and Liam as the older man was still holding and trying to comfort his son.

Despite everything that had been done to the boy, he still loved his mother just because she was his mother. And perhaps, up until this point, she really was the good mother that Roy had suspected she had been and that people in the town still swore she was. It would be difficult for the boy to reconcile that image of the woman his mother had once been with what she'd done to him, that she'd dome something so terrible she'd been killed for it.

At least Ed's memories of his mother were clear. She had been a wonderful woman whose life had been taken because a disease. His memories of her remained intact. He only hoped that Liam never blamed his father. He was certain that would kill them both in the long run.

There were still a few questions left, such as how Karen had found out about the transfer of the tattoo and where things would stand now between himself and Roy. For now, he watched as Armstrong heading back to the basement door and drawing a circle on the ground.

"Brother," Al's voice said quietly, "why don't you go for treatment and to get that blood off of you?"

Seeing his brother's nearly spotless hand reaching out for his own bloody one, Ed managed the faintest smile and took it.

The train ride home was a quiet one, as Roy, Ed and Liam shared a compartment. Despite cramped quarters and a spare bed, the three spent the ride sound asleep. The older men hadn't spoken of those moments underground and what they witnessed as Karen attempted to combine their bodies. Instead, they all three needed the closeness of one another and the reassurance they were all still very much alive.

It would be the only real respite that the three would have for some time. The return to Amestris would present them with higher ups wanting to know more about the late Major Tyler's research and how close Amestris had come to facing off against a Drachman army of chimeras.

Liam would take some time to get back to his usual self, and Ed the cat would take the better part of a year to warm up to Roy, though he obviously liked the other Ed immediately. Smiles would come from the boy more and more as days turned to weeks turned to months.  
Roy's team would do them the favor of moving all of the blond's belongings back to the house while the alchemists would become preoccupied by the countless reports to the military. There would be no more secrets about what Shou Tucker had done nor Karen. Nearly everyone in the military agreed that the secrets were what had allowed Karen to get away with performing the transmutations. No one had known what to look for, though all the signs now seemed obvious. There would be some of the higher-ups who would argue that keeping a secret was what prevented more from trying to perform the transmutations, but most would be swayed to see the perspective of those who had seen Karen's chimera army. The era of stamping a generic banned label on certain transmutations would be coming to an end in favor of the same label and an explanation of why.

In Central, Melissa Rosenberg was already in the process of firing one of her nurses for performing an unauthorized check for chicken pox on Liam, when instructions had been clear that Melissa was the only one allowed to see him. The nurse would soon find that her ax to grind against Roy would lead to prison for her with her former employer gladly testifying against her. Riza, so pleased with her lover's protective nature over Roy and Liam would take the final step to move in with the good doctor and get ready for the birth of their son, Kiefer.

Lieutenant Everett would ask to be transferred to Central to work under Ed's command. Though not an alchemist, he would offer an outside perspective on the state alchemy program and eventually learn more about the science than some alchemists.

The whirlwind that was Winry Rockbell would visit and repair Ed's automail and fall absolutely in love with little Liam and plans for a trip to Risembool to visit Al and Winry would be made before she was at the alchemists' home for more than a few hours. Both Ed and Roy would know that if they didn't visit, didn't keep in touch, it would be only upon the risk of death.

But for now…

Roy's eyes opened slowly to look across his son's dark head to the pale eyelashes of his lover. As he was able to focus on the larger picture, he took in the golden-toned skin and soft-yet-masculine features that he loved and could nearly draw from memory.

"You're staring," Ed said, cracking open just one amber eye.

"I love you," Roy blurted out without any sort of preamble.

Ed's other eye opened impossibly large, though Roy wasn't sure why. Ed had to have seen Roy's memories, heard the thoughts as though they were his own. More than once Roy knew in those memories he looked at Ed as his lover, his love.

"You tell me this now with your son asleep between us?" Ed hissed back in a whisper.

"Can't think of a better time." He looked at Ed anxiously.

"You know, I should hold off for a few moths from saying it back like you did to me," Ed said. "Lucky for you I'm not a sadistic bastard like you." Ed moved forward just enough to press his lips to Roy's. "I love you too. Idiot."

"You or me?" Roy responded with a smirk.

Ed rolled his eyes, but refused to answer.

As far as the blond was concerned, the grin that lit up Roy's face made the arguments and putting up with the secrets worth it. He was as much of a fool, loving Roy the way he did, but hell, as long as they were fools together—honest ones—then it didn't matter.

He watched as the exhaustion overtook the older man once again, the grin becoming a dreamy smile, and felt the boy between them sigh quietly, though he was still out. For once not arguing with the general consensus, Ed relinquished himself to sleep.


End file.
